


Young Blood

by ToukoTai



Category: Big Hero 6 (2014)
Genre: AU where everyone is still upset, Gen, Happy Ending, Kidnapping, but it all works out, missing presumed dead
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-19
Updated: 2015-03-29
Packaged: 2018-03-08 06:37:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 25,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3199148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ToukoTai/pseuds/ToukoTai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The fire took his brother, his teacher and his voice. His robot and his friends give him back all three.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

This didn’t make any sense at all. Tadashi looked down at the dish in his hand to the warehouse door and back down again. The lone microbot clinked insistently against the glass, no matter which way he moved, the microbot homed in on the warehouse. The place was clearly abandoned. He inspected the lock on the door, giving it a few experimental tugs and when it didn’t budge, shrugged.

He wasn’t entirely sure why he was out here in the first place, following the lead of a single prototype robot that had probably been damaged _in the fire_. Except this little microbot hadn’t been near the flames. It had been in Hiro’s hoodie pocket, the one he had shrugged out of when Tadashi had grabbed his collar. _‘It’ll take me like two seconds, two. I just don’t want to leave the transmitter there.”_ He’d called over his shoulder and Tadashi, idiot that he was, had just tossed the hoodie over his own shoulder and waited. _It felt like he was still waiting for Hiro to get back, even weeks later_.

Tadashi is a genius, not nearly as smart as Hiro is. _Was_. And he’s been through this once before when their parents had died. But. It’s different this time. It’s his little baby brother. The kid he watched grow up, who was supposed to change _everything_ one day. The smartest person in the whole world, dead. At fourteen, barely even a decade of life. _And it was his fault_. Hiro wouldn’t have been at the showcase, wouldn’t have been in the fire, if Tadashi hadn’t pushed him. Hiro had been happy enough just bot battling on the streets. But Tadashi just _had_ to get involved and look what happened?

There’s a part of him that’s angry, so _angry_ , with himself, with the school, even with Professor Callaghan.(you shouldn’t be angry with the dead.) The anger curls in a place just behind the walls of his teeth and he can’t open his mouth, can’t talk, because all that anger will just come spewing out. There’s another part that refuses to accept that Hiro’s dead. Tadashi knows the stages of grief, he knows denial, he knows anger. He’s caught between these two. He knows this isn’t healthy and that Hiro wouldn’t want him wasting his life away in mourning or obsession. But.

They didn’t find a body.

They didn’t find either body actually, Hiro’s or Professor Callaghan’s. Nothing at all, no trace left behind, not even a single scrap of clothing. They’d had a closed casket service, buried an empty jar in an empty grave. And it had poured rain the entire time. All his friends had been there, because somewhere along the way, in between late nights and early mornings and watching Hiro’s manic building spree, they’d become his brother’s friends too. Wasabi had held the umbrella because Tadashi’s hands had been shaking too hard and Fred held the other umbrella for Aunt Cass. Aunt Cass’s arm was threaded through Honey Lemon’s, leaning against her, for such a slight thin woman, Honey Lemon was as sturdy as a rock. For once, Gogo wasn’t chewing gum, she just stood next to him, close enough their elbows could touch, but without saying anything. Tadashi was grateful for that. He hadn’t been sure what would have come out of his mouth if he had opened it.

A part of Tadashi can’t believe that Hiro was really…gone, without the confirmation of a body. A small part of him kept saying ‘what if?’ in the back of his head. Like a broken record and it was slowly starting to drive him crazy.

The rescue and cleanup crews also hadn’t found any of Hiro’s microbots in the aftermath. That hadn’t seemed important until this morning, when a rustling noise had come from the silent, still corner of Hiro’s side of the room. Specifically from the hoodie Tadashi had reverently hung over the back of the desk chair.

He’s almost afraid to touch it, to step anywhere near the empty living space. But the pocket of the hoodie is jerking and his curiosity gets the best of him. Megabot gets the best of him in a more literal sense, falling off the desk where Hiro had propped it, when the rolling chair slips from under Tadashi’s fingers. The bot hits his foot, drags noise from him where nothing else could. Hiro had always known how to get a response from Tadashi. When Baymax asks him to rate his pain, he’s not sure how to respond. His mouth opens and closes and Hiro’s words from forever ago echo through his head.

_Physical or emotional?_

He hadn’t quite gotten to this section of medical health in Baymax’s programming. It hardly matters, whatever he missed his robot can teach himself. And Baymax does, though Tadashi isn’t sure how excited he should be about that, since the first thing Baymax does is try to get him to call his friends. Tadashi doesn’t want to talk to anyone, can’t. Hasn’t said a word since before the funeral, since the inferno. Aunt Cass is more than worried, he’s sure his friends aren’t much better. But he can’t _say anything_. He doesn’t know what will come out of his mouth if he opens it to talk. So he doesn’t talk. Doesn’t cry. Doesn’t yell. Stays as silent as he can. Tadashi isn’t sure how to explain this to Baymax. Isn’t sure if the robot will understand it, even with the new database download.

The hoodie jerks again, the pocket smacking frantically against the wood and Tadashi forgets about his pain. Forgets about talking. And follows the little bit of metal like a compass.

Now here he was, his robot behind him, his brother’s in front of him and an abandoned warehouse looming over him.

There’s no way out but through.

What he finds inside makes him sick. To his stomach. And he has to take a few minutes to dry heave in a corner with Baymax rubbing his back and voicing muted concerns. Someone is manufacturing microbots. There’s a room of glass with robotic arms, churning out little beads of black and grey. There’s a bed set far back in the corner of the room, hidden in the shadows, Tadashi pays it no attention. All his focus is on the barrels and barrels of microbots outside the glass room.

Someone _stole_ Hiro’s last invention. The one he poured all of his heart and soul and pride into. All of his hopes and dreams and that big, bright future that Tadashi had _known_ was right around the corner for his little brother. One step from greatness, now so much ash and memories.

And someone _took it away_.

That’s the thought that sticks in his head after running to safety from the reaching, branching, spikes of black, angry microbots. Microbots can’t feel emotion, Tadashi knows this, he helped double and triple check the designs, he was there for every step of their creation. Microbots don’t emote, but the person directing the microbots? That person does. When Hiro directed them, the Microbots flowed smoothly, swirled skillfully over each other, moved like so much water, had the same playful, mischievous air that Hiro did.

The person behind these microbots is _angry_.

But so is Tadashi.

He slumps down on the desk chair in the garage lab after the narrow getaway. Sitting in it backwards, like Gogo, with his arms crossed over the backrest, chin resting on his arms, hat twisted around, glaring at the wall as he worked his way through his thoughts.

Someone’s making microbots, for what, he doesn’t know, he doesn’t care. He knows it’s not for any noble purpose. Someone took his brother’s invention, from the showcase. Someone was desperate enough to steal it. Someone _set_ the fire to cover their tracks and Hiro _died_.

Tadashi’s eyes focus on Baymax as his robot suggests he call his friends for _emotional support_. Tadashi doesn’t need or want emotional support. He wants to know _why_. Why the fire, why the microbots, _why Hiro_?

He’s not stupid enough to think he can just stroll up and ask whoever has Hiro’s microbots. He’s not naive enough to think whoever has them will just give them back.

Not without a fight.

He’s rather surprised to find he’s not upset with that. That he’s totally okay with it. That he really wouldn’t mind going to head to head with whoever took Hiro’s microbots. With whoever helped cause Hiro’s death. (He’s tired of beating himself up about it.)

 

It doesn’t work out at all how Tadashi thought it would. And he’s willing to admit that without his friends’ interference he might have been seriously injured. In his defense, how do you plan for someone throwing shipping containers at you?

The minor revelations for the night are that his friends are the best, he might be going a little crazy from grief and guilt and Fred is apparently a billionaire. Or something close to that.

There is, of course, one more major revelation, and Baymax is the one to deliver it.

“Hiro was there.” Tadashi sighed heavily. Around him, the tension jacked up as his friends seemed to pull in closer around him. He had the best friends and they meant well, but nothing was going to make this all better.

“Baymax, Hiro...isn’t coming back.” It hurt to have someone say it out loud, even if that someone was Honey Lemon, with her voice quiet and soft. Filling in the space that Tadashi couldn’t. It hurt to admit. On any level. Baymax just blinked, black eyes clicking, his head tilted to the side.

“My scanner says otherwise. Patient Hiro Hamada was rescanned at seventeen forty five. And while his condition is not the best, his vital signs were very strong.” A blue diagram of Hiro’s body, appeared on Baymax’s stomach. Statistics and numbers from the scan indicating heart rate, body temperature and other pieces of data appeared alongside it, also in the same muted shade of blue as the diagram.

“What the…?” The group could only try to process the information, and Tadashi found he had to take several steps back, to drop onto the sofa before he could even begin to wrap his mind around it.

“Tadashi, what are the odds of Baymax’s scanner being wrong?” Tadashi managed to pull himself together to answer Honey Lemon, with a distracted head shake. Not that anyone could blame him.

There was zero chance that Baymax could scan something like this wrong. No chance _at all_. A flurry of questions and speculation follows. Tadashi lets the words wash over him. Still in silent shock. There had been a cot, inside the glassed in room where the microbots were being made. Pushed off in a dark corner. He can’t remember if there had been someone in it. But there had been a bed. Why hadn’t he taken the time to look? Why hadn't he paid attention when Baymax had tried to tell him earlier?

“So that means, Hiro’s still alive?”

“And whoever took his microbots has him.”

“Baymax,” Gogo is always straight to the point. “What did you get from Hiro’s scan?”

“Patient Hiro Hamada has suffered second degree burns on his right arm and side concurrent with a severe electric shock, as well as mild smoke damage to his lungs and altered brain chemistry and function. There was also a mix of sedatives in his bloodstream.” Wait, what. The diagram of Hiro on Baymax’s stomach lit up the areas in red, along with the chemical formula for the sedatives. “With adequate medical care, he would make a full recovery.”

“I left him.” It’s quiet at first, so quiet Wasabi is the only one to hear it. “He was right there.”

“Hey man,” He tries to put a hand on Tadashi’s shoulder, a moment of comfort that Tadashi shakes off, angrily, impatiently.

“I _left_ him there! He was right in front of me, and I _left_.” His voice rose in agitation, rough and ragged from weeks of disuse.

“You didn’t know he was there, Tadashi!”

“I didn’t _look_! There was a cot, _right there_! I _didn’t look_! I’m his _brother_! I’m supposed to be there for him!”

“Not when you didn’t know! You’re not a superhero.” That hit a chord in Tadashi, snapped him out of his frenzy. His eyes focused on the giant superhero picture on the wall.

“No, but I could be.” Honey Lemon follows his eyes to the mural.

“You mean, _we_ could be.” She says adamantly. Tadashi starts, a shiver from his shoulders down. Gogo chews her gum, eyes narrowed, but she nods.

“What about the police?” Wasabi tries, hands wringing. Gogo gives him a look.

“Like they’ll believe us? Hiro’s been declared _dead_.” Tadashi doesn’t even flinch, because he had been right. That part that was stuck in denial was right and Hiro’s _not_ dead.

“Oh oh oh!” Fred slung his arms around Wasabi and Gogo’s shoulders, pulling them closer to himself. “You guys know what this means, right? Right?”

“That if you don’t let me go, you won’t be using that arm anymore?” Fred was undaunted.

“RESCUE MISSION!”


	2. Chapter 2

Designing the suits is hard; Tadashi knows it would have been easier with Hiro. His brother always had a thing for superheros and mechs. Always had more creative energy then any one person knew what to do with.(enter the bot fighting problem) Always had the brain to really go all out and make it _work_. But they don’t have Hiro right now, that’s sort of the whole point of this, a catch twenty two in action, need Hiro to design the suits, need the suits to get Hiro back. Daytime and nighttime blur together for a bit as they make do with what they can. Building, refining, inventing, creating. It takes them _weeks_ to do what Tadashi is certain Hiro could have done in a couple of days. But they finally manage to pull things together.

“As exciting as this all is, it still doesn’t solve the problem of finding Hiro and whoever that other guy was.” Wasabi brings up one night as he adjusts his lasers one last time.

“If I upgrade his scanner, Baymax should be able to find Hiro once he’s at a high enough vantage point.” Tadashi squints at the display in front of him, types in a few more calculations. Aunt Cass is overjoyed that he’s talking again, and spending time with his friends. He tries not to feel bad about the fact that she doesn’t know exactly what he does with his friends or exactly why he’s started talking again.

Tadashi doesn’t want to break the news to her until he has Hiro back. There’s a small voice in his head that doesn’t quite believe it either. He doesn’t want to see what face Aunt Cass would make if he tried to tell her. Even with his friends’ support and Baymax’s scans.

 

Hiro’s side of the room is no longer the depressing, empty, soul sucking void it used to be. Not now that he knows Hiro is out there, somewhere. Waiting for Tadashi to come get him, Tadashi has every intention of doing just that, as soon as humanly possible. Tadashi goes through Hiro’s side, and cleans. Hiro’s going to yell at him for it, when he gets back. Tadashi can’t quite keep the small smile off his face. His brother is going to be _so upset_ that Tadashi went through his things while he was gone. But the important part is that Hiro will be there to _be_ upset. Tadashi moves somewhat mechanically, dusts everywhere, throws away crumpled papers, empty candy bags, dry pens, broken pencils. He straightens the toys on the shelves, re-organizes the books, changes the sheets on the bed. Opens the shades on the windows to let in the dying sunlight. Everything has to be _perfect_ for when Hiro gets back.

_Just a little longer Hiro_. He thinks, running a thumb over Megabot’s head. _Just hold on for a little longer._

 

The beauty of the sunset is almost lost on Tadashi, standing on the koi blimp, Baymax scanning the city at his side. It takes longer then he would like for Baymax’s new scanner to complete its function. The pressing need to get Hiro back as quickly as possible drums through Tadashi’s veins but there’s nothing to really do up here while he waits for the scan to complete. So he sits down, and the sun starts to sink. It turns the clouds soft shades of orange and yellow nearer to the sun, cotton candy pink and purple and blue farther away. It’s quiet, this far up, tranquil, just the sound of the fan underneath them. Peaceful. Tadashi cracks his back and rolls his shoulders, plopping down to sit on the turbine and takes the time to breathe.

He’s been so caught up lately, swinging from extremes. Trying to mourn Hiro, trying to move past the guilt and the anger, trying not to let himself slip too far. And now, trying to get Hiro back, the extreme elation, the overwhelming relief, the manic drive and the ever present anger.

Tadashi takes this moment, these few minutes to just _breathe_. To put aside the stress and the fear and everything else that’s been clawing at him. Pulls air in through his nose, counts to five and slowly lets it out through his mouth. Tilts his head back to watch the purple and blue colors spread as the sun sets.

_Everything is going to be okay_ , he promises himself, promises Hiro.

Baymax is going to find Hiro, his friends and Tadashi were going to go get Hiro back and then he was never going to let his idiot brother out of his sight again. Baymax moves from his stillness behind him and Tadashi is instantly on his feet.

Time to go.

 

The island is silent and deserted looking. But this is where Hiro is, Baymax’s scanner can’t lie and it can’t be wrong. Tadashi programmed it himself.

They find him in the maze of the deserted base. Through the twisting dark, musty corridors behind a door that isn’t locked and doesn’t look any different from the other doors in the hallway. The room is small, was probably a personal room for someone stationed on the base. There’s a desk, a chair, a small bookcase, a wardrobe. All empty. But curled up on the bed stationed in the corner, in a nest of blankets, is Hiro. Dark hair lank, skin pale, bruises under his eyes, bandages covering his right arm and head, and utterly dead to the world.

Tadashi is across the small space and next to the bed in record time. But he falters there. Stalls out. Wants to reach out and touch Hiro, his fingers twitch with the desire to run them through Hiro’s hair. Can’t at the same time. Gauntleted hands frozen in air, shaking with fine tremors.

Now that Hiro is right in front of him, less than a foot away, thin chest rising and falling with soft breaths, all the horror and pain and terror of the last month and a half have Tadashi frozen. He wants to touch Hiro, poke him, check his pulse, check his bandages, wrap Hiro up in his arms and hold his little brother as tightly as he can. Never let him go. At the same time, he doesn’t, can’t do it. Can’t reach out, can’t touch him, won’t touch him.

Because what if he touches Hiro and finds out, _this isn’t real_? What if he touches Hiro and Tadashi wakes up, back in his bed, with Hiro’s empty side of the room on the other side of the screen? What if this is all a horrible dream and nothing happened and Hiro’s still dead? Tadashi can’t do it, wants to, needs to, but that fear, that terror, that this is all fake, holds him firmly in place.

It’s a good thing his friends are there with him. Or else he might have been stuck in that little room, staring at Hiro until the masked man came back.

“What are you waiting for?” Fred asks him in the worst stage whisper known to man. “Little dude’s right there.” Gogo punches his shoulder and that’s what jars him into action.

“Come on, Tadashi, woman up. He’s alive, we made it.” Tadashi yanks his gauntlet off and reaches out. Touches Hiro, cups the side of his sleeping brother’s face in the curve of his hand. Breathes out a shaky sigh of relief when nothing changes and Hiro is still under his hand. Now there’s room to be concerned. Over the amount of bandages, ‘electrical shock’ took care of most of what was going on with Hiro’s right side, but what had happened to his head? And why wasn’t Hiro waking up?

His brother doesn’t so much as twitch when Tadashi unwraps part of the bandages around his forehead and sees familiar circuit marks burned into the skin, red and angry. Baymax says it’s the sedatives in Hiro’s bloodstream, says his little brother has lost weight, says there’s still second degree electrical burns from his right arm up, says with proper care Hiro will make a full recovery. Tadashi grips Hiro’s wrist, the one not heavily bandaged, and feels for himself the sluggishly beating pulse. Nearly cries in relief. Hiro really is alive, has been all this while and now Tadashi has him and is going to take him  _home_. Now that Tadashi has found Hiro alive, he’s very, very keen to keep him that way.

“Hospital.” He chokes out, feeling numb with relief. “We need to get him to a hospital.”

They bundle Hiro up in several of the blankets, try to be as gentle as they can around his injuries. Hiro doesn’t even shift on his own, stays as still as death, and Tadashi has to keep watching his chest move to reassure himself.

“It will take eight hours for the sedative to wear off.” Baymax helpfully supplies. “Longer for the painkiller.” But Tadashi doesn’t want to cause Hiro even the slightest chance of discomfort. (He also doesn’t want to let go of Hiro, but concedes that Baymax is the best choice for carrying the injured boy.)

The way back out is harder than the way in, with a series of wrong turns, and everyone getting more and more frustrated until they find themselves in a huge room, looking at the ruins of two giant rings and a bank of video screens. Curiosity gets the best of them; they watch the video file still on the computers. It answers some questions, raises even more.

It still turns out to be the worst decision ever.

 

“What’s the plan?!” Wasabi very nearly shrieks as microbots spill through the room. Tadashi steps closer to Baymax.

“Keep Hiro safe. Get the mask!” This time it goes just marginally better than the first time. Gogo and Honey aren’t used to working together, take each other out instead of the masked man. Baymax, Tadashi, Wasabi and Fred have their own problems trying to keep the microbots from getting Hiro, trying to keep from jostling Hiro too much. The man seems determined to take Hiro back, the majority of the microbots swarming them. It takes everything Wasabi and Fred have to keep the wave back. Tadashi doesn’t understand why. Why be so focused on Hiro? The man already has enough microbots, more than enough, he knows how to create them too, and he clearly has a neurotransmitter, so why does he still need Hiro?

Tadashi decides to get the answer from the man directly.

A lucky hit causes makes him regret that decision. The man hits the ground, the mask flips off, the microbots collapse and it’s not Alister Krei, it’s Professor Callaghan. Something snaps inside of Tadashi when the first thing out his mentor’s mouth is: ‘ _give me the boy_ ’

Not Hiro, not Tadashi’s little brother. Just ‘the boy’. Just some faceless, nameless child. A tool, not a person. Like the man expects Tadashi to hand over the most important thing in his life but hasn’t bothered to remember or use Hiro’s own name.

No.

Not happening.

Not ever.

Tadashi doesn’t care that Callaghan was his professor, throws away in an instant the affection he had for his mentor, doesn’t care what Callaghan wants Hiro for, that doesn’t matter in the least. _None_ of the past matters anymore. What matters is that Tadashi isn’t letting his old professor anywhere _near_ Hiro. Not now, not ever again.

Callaghan will have to step over Tadashi’s cold dead body before he gets to Hiro.

For a split second, Tadashi considers killing Callaghan. He could do it, Callaghan is older, weaker, without his, without _Hiro’s_ microbots (never forget that they were Hiro’s first.). Tadashi has been studying martial arts since he was seven.

Hiro’s never going to be safe with Callaghan out there. Tadashi can see it in the desperation in the old man’s eyes. He’ll never stop trying to get Hiro and Tadashi cannot allow that. He takes one step forward and Gogo’s voice snaps him back. His friends know him well enough to read his intent from how his back straightens and his hands curl into themselves.

“Tadashi! Don’t you fucking dare!” Gogo dodges around a falling piece of rock, skidding to a halt next to him. He turns his head to face her and she refuses to step down, staring back at him just as hard. Honey Lemon grabs his arm; her fingers are bands of steel, fearless, steady. Used to mixing the exact measurements of chemicals that could quite literally blow up in her face. Now is much the same.

“Hiro needs you _now_.” She says, voice firm, as unrelenting as her grip.

“This place is going down, we need to go and Hiro needs a hospital.” Gogo hisses. He follows her line of sight to behind him and his heart nearly stops. Fred has just blasted a huge chunk of the falling ceiling away from Baymax. Baymax, waiting patiently with Hiro bundled in his arms. Waiting for Tadashi. Always waiting, his brother was.

Waiting for school to be interesting.

Waiting for the other kids to catch up.

Waiting for the adults to _get it_.

Waiting for the world to be ready for him.

Waiting and waiting until he’d gotten sick of it.

And look how that had turned out.

Honey Lemon doesn’t need to keep her grip on his arm, he’s forgotten all about Callaghan. Doesn’t see the man scramble grab the mask and use Hiro’s microbots to escape. Doesn’t care. All his attention is on getting from where he is to where Baymax is.

There’s only one person in whole wide world that matters right now.

He’s not going to forget that again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was going to update tomorrow but said 'screw it'  
> Go big or go home amirite?


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> screw mondays man, SUNDAY is the new update day.

Tadashi’s plan of action is as follows:

Get Hiro safe, get Hiro to the hospital, make sure his baby brother was _beyond_ okay, _then_ deal with Callaghan.

It goes pretty well, all things considered.

Like having to call Aunt Cass from the hospital with nurses, receptionists and patients watching his friends and him warily. Perhaps it would have been a better idea to change _before_ coming to the hospital. But no, Hiro needed to get here as quickly as possible, Baymax could only do so much on his own and Tadashi didn’t want to stall anymore then they already had.

“Hi Aunt Cass. Yes, I know it’s late. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to worry you.” Tadashi leaned against the wall with the phone tucked against his shoulder, filling out everything he knew about Hiro’s medical history as nurses bustled around him. Wasabi and Honey Lemon with Baymax’s help try to answer the questions about Hiro’s current condition only a few steps away. “Just. I’m at the hospital right now. No, I’m okay. I’m not hurt. Aunt Cass. _Aunt Cass_.” He rubs his forehead. There’s a headache starting to sink in from behind his eyes, a result of the stress he’s put himself under. “We’re at UCSF medical center. Oh, uh, my friends from school. No, none of them got hurt either. I need to tell you in person, no, it’s not anything bad. _No one got hurt_. Promise. Okay, I love you too Aunt Cass.” Tadashi gives his full attention to the forms once he’s finished with calling Aunt Cass. He doesn’t even want to _think_ about what the legal tape will be for restoring Hiro’s not dead status. Once he’s done with the medical history forms, he sinks down into a chair, helmet in his lap. There’s nothing to do now but wait. Wasabi pats his shoulder sympathetically and then has to scramble out of the way for Baymax’s hug treatment. Tadashi relaxes into the squeaking vinyl. Having Hiro back means that while a whole lot of his emotional problems just got solved, a whole bunch of new problems have popped up.

Case in point:

Aunt Cass finding out about the extracurricular activities his friends and he have engaged in. When she arrives, she’s a hurricane of nervous, angry, confused energy. Which is brought up short when she sees Tadashi...and the team, still in their suits. She’s speechless, angry speechless. But any words she might have for them, are gone once she’s told _why_ they’re there and by the time Tadashi has explained to her _in detail_ for the third time, because it took two tries to get _Hiro is alive_ to sink in before Aunt Cass was ready for the entire story, the doctor allows them in to sit with Hiro. Who’s still asleep and will be for a long time yet. But has been given the ‘will survive just fine with no real lasting damage’ seal of approval by the doctor.

Tadashi has no doubt there will be a stern talking to in his future. But having Hiro, having his little brother, as safe and sound as he can be in a hospital bed, makes everything worth it. More than worth it. Even Aunt Cass agrees, if the way she goes still and silent at the sight of Hiro is any indication. Tadashi hadn’t ever wanted to see Aunt Cass cry, hadn’t ever actually _seen_ her cry. Even after his parents’ death, even during the time of Hiro’s ‘death’ she had remained dry eyed, head held up, a force to be reckoned with, a rock of stability among the mourning and the grief and the funeral plans. But now, faced with her youngest nephew, back from the dead and looking as though he was just asleep, in a white hospital bed, with white sheets that made him look younger and smaller then he was. She makes a choked little sound and covers her mouth with her hands. Tears slipping down her cheeks as she rushes into the room.

“Oh baby,” She says, leaning down over Hiro, voice thick with tears. Tadashi has to look away, to give her this moment. He wasn’t the only one grieving Hiro after all. Aunt Cass collapses in a chair next to the bed. Never taking her eyes off her nephew. “Oh honey. I thought we lost you.” Her hands reach out to hold Hiro’s undamaged hand, pull it up between her own as though she were praying as she cries harder. Her breath hitches with the force of her sobs. “I thought you were _gone_.”

So did everyone else, except for a tiny microbot, Baymax and the half of Tadashi that had been steeped in denial.

 

The emergency room staff worked quickly when they first brought Hiro in.

 _Strong little guy._ The nurse told him after they’d been let into Hiro’s room. _He’s a fighter_.

Tadashi could have told her that, but he keeps his mouth shut. Thanks her with a nod. He’s too keyed up to sit, so he leans against the wall next to the bed, while Aunt Cass takes one of the chairs and pulls Hiro’s hand into her own. Honey Lemon takes the other, Gogo flat out drops onto the end of Hiro’s bed, taking care to avoid his blanketed feet. Fred pulls off half his costume with an exaggerated sigh of relief slumping in the corner to turn on the tv, just so there’s some background noise, Tadashi makes a mental note to look into better ventilation for his suit. Wasabi leaves to get coffee and snacks for everyone.

No one is talking, and that’s just fine with Tadashi. He’s got other things to think over, now that Hiro is safe. He knows the extent of Hiro’s injuries, thanks to Baymax and the medical staff, but he doesn’t know _how_ Hiro got them.

Electrical burns. How do you get electrical burns during a fire? Obviously, when the hall was burning wires may have gotten loose. But Hiro would know to stay away from that.(unless something had happened to throw him off.) The circuit marks on his head meant that he had been wearing the neurotransmitter at the time of the shock, but then how had Callaghan gotten it? And why? Why had Callaghan, his professor, his teacher, his mentor, his friend, why had he _done this_? (He knew how much Hiro meant to Tadashi.)

These are the thoughts that chase around in his head while they wait for news on Hiro’s condition.

These are the things churning around in his skull while they wait in Hiro’s room.(Hiro looks better, iv lines and transfusions turning his pale skin back to pink, the dark circles under his eyes lighter. His chest moves up and down steadily but the doctor says he won’t wake up for a while yet, whatever Callaghan had given him needed to work its way through his system.)

Those are the things pounding through his mind when a special bulletin comes over the TV in Hiro’s room. There’s a masked man attacking Alistair Krei’s unveiling ceremony.

He’s on his feet in an instant.

“Tadashi?” He glances at Aunt Cass, sitting in the chair by the bedside, holding one of Hiro’s hands. Her eyes burn into him.

“I have to go.” He says, distractedly. “If I don’t, people will get hurt.”

“ _You_ could get hurt. Or worse.” Aunt Cass argues. “And then what will we, what will _I_ tell Hiro?” That does stop him, makes him pause for all of a few seconds.

“Aunt Cass, _he_ did this. To Hiro.” Tadashi pointed to the screen, his eyes locked with his Aunt’s. “If I don’t stop him, he’ll come after Hiro again. I can’t _let him_.” She doesn’t relent and Tadashi can’t break her gaze to go on his own. But that’s why he has a team.

“If _we_ don’t stop him.” Gogo says, “A lot more people will be hurt.” Aunt Cass refuses to turn her eyes away from Tadashi, but the tightness around her lips loosens.

“We have a plan this time.” Wasabi adds, rather cautiously from the corner where he’d been watching the showdown after returning with the food and beverages.

“You’re all going?” Aunt Cass asks. There’s a lot of head nodding and a very enthusiastic yes from Fred. She sighs, her shoulders dropping, her eyes break the stare as she closes them. “Then you better be quick, you wouldn’t want to miss Hiro would you?” She opens them again when she gives Tadashi a watery smile.

“No.” Tadashi breathes. Aunt Cass stands up and holds out her arms.

“Last hug.” Tadashi feels it through his armor, like Aunt Cass is trying to keep him together with the force of her hug, he returns it just as fiercely. Leans down torun his hand through Hiro's hair one more time, takes the moment to whisper _wait for me_. And then they’re out the door.

 

Their teamwork isn’t exact, but it’s so much better then last time. This confrontation is going to go _a lot_ differently.

Tadashi isn’t about to let Callaghan slip away again. His professor had a lot to answer for, and Tadashi was determined that he answer _now_. If it meant diving head first into danger, then so be it. If it meant destroying his brother’s creation, then yeah, okay, that gave him a little pause. But in the end, there was only one way to win this. And Tadashi refused to lose. Couldn’t lose. Not this time.

So he doesn’t, so _they_ don’t.

Baymax shatters the neurotransmitter, exposes Callaghan to the world. But Tadashi is more concerned with his answers then the fall out right now. Behind them the portal pulses as Tadashi crouches in front of Callaghan. There are so many questions burning their way in his throat, but they can really all be summed up by one word.

“ _Why?_ ” Tadashi growls, so angry he can’t even really articulate more then that.

“It was an accident!” The response is just as rough as Tadashi’s question. Not a defense, just an angry statement. Thankfully Callaghan knows exactly what Tadashi was asking. “I meant for the fire to get everyone out of the building but he. He had the transmitter.” Tadashi yanked the older man closer by the jacket.

“ _What did you do?_ ” He snarled, Callaghan's defiance melted in the heat of Tadashi's anger.

“I tried to take it from him but he tripped and fell. There were exposed wires. He grabbed them by mistake. And the shock...it did _something_ to him.” What was it Baymax had said? _Altered Brain chemistry and function_. Tadashi had attributed that to the sedatives. “It should have killed him.” That didn’t make Tadashi any less angry. Even though he knew Hiro was at the hospital not even a full mile from where they were, as safe as he could be while the tranquilizers worked their way out of his system.

“Why did you let us, let _me_ , think he was dead? How could you do that?” Because for several weeks after the fire, Tadashi had believed his brother to be dead. His little baby brother. Who followed Tadashi around on unsteady toddler feet, who gripped the hem of his shirt with tiny fingers. Who continued to amaze him, who drove him _up the wall_ with his bot fighting antics, who made him so proud with his creation. Who he loved so _much_ , who he'd missed  _so m_ _uch,_ his little brother, Hiro. Tadashi had gone through with the funeral and the mourning and the grief and the guilt and the anger and the _entire damn time_ his brother was alive. Alive and alone and _hurt_. And Callaghan had him and hadn’t let anyone know.

“I _needed him_!” Callaghan roared back. “The microbots wouldn’t work correctly without him.” Not the answer Tadashi was looking for. He’s never been one for violence, but it feels good to hear the crack of bone when his fist breaks Callaghan’s nose.

“Please.” The man says, blood pouring down his face, eyes slightly dazed. His voice sounds like every one of his years. “My daughter. He killed my Abigail.”

Tadashi drops Callaghan like he’s on fire and backs away. He knows what that’s like, dear god how he knows. The all-consuming anger, the rage, the helpless, hopeless depth of sorrow. He’d been teetering on the brink of it himself for weeks after the showcase. It scares Tadashi to think what he might have done.

The only real difference between Callaghan and Tadashi is measurable by the range of Baymax’s scanner and Tadashi’s friends.

Which kicks in again for one more miracle.

“Tadashi, I am detecting signs of life from the portal.”

Tadashi only hesitates for a split second. But he knows he wouldn’t be able to face Hiro if he doesn’t save Abigail.

 

Flashing lights, paramedics and police rushing around, Tadashi sees them load Abigail into the ambulance at the same time as her father is pushed into a squad car. The tension that had been packed under his shoulders and held tightly in his center whooshed out with a sigh. Baymax might be gone, but he could rebuild him. Callaghan was in custody, Abigail had been saved and Hiro was safe back at the hospital with Aunt Cass. Definitely _not_ dead, just sleeping and would wake up soon. Fred slapped him hard enough in the back to make him stumble, even with the armor. It only lasted for a minute.

What should have been a moment of calm after the storm, exploded, as the remaining deactivated microbots suddenly jittered along the ground and then shot across the space to clump together.

The transmitter was gone, Baymax had shattered it. The microbots shouldn’t be anything more than dead bits of metal without it. But like a small swarm of ants, the microbots swirled around and around each other, creating the effect of a rippling black puddle on the ground. Agitated, was the only way Tadashi could describe it. He made it halfway toward the puddle, determined to figure out what was going on and the microbots stopped. Froze. But instead of returning to deactivation, they started rippling across the ground, faster and faster. Shooting out branches of themselves and flowing over grass, metal and concrete.

Headed toward the hospital.

Where Hiro was.

The realization was like getting punched in the stomach. The warnings Callahan had been trying to give him, pulled themselves together in Tadashi’s mind.

 _Altered brain function and chemistry_.

Circuit marks burned into his forehead.

_He had the neurotransmitter._

No, he had _on_ the neurotransmitter.

_The shock did something to him._

The shock ran up his arm and into the band and into his head, into his brain.

 _The microbots wouldn’t work correctly without him_.

That wasn’t entirely true, the microbots worked just fine without Hiro, they didn’t work just fine when he was awake. And that was the whole thing, wasn’t it? The microbots didn’t follow the neurotransmitter when Hiro was awake, because Hiro _was a neurotransmitter_. So Callaghan had to keep him sedated and close by, in order to work the microbots himself. (It’s certainly an extremely large measure of relief and peace of mind to know that Callaghan wasn’t so far gone as to kill Hiro, to make controlling the microbots easier.) When Tadashi and the others had rescued Hiro, it had pushed Callaghan that further bit over the edge, made him that little bit more desperate and dangerous. He had to make sure he still had control of the microbots to finish what he started before Hiro woke up.

Which meant that right now, Hiro was awake. And, if the behavior of the bots was any indication, extremely distressed. (Because the microbots didn’t emote, the person behind the microbots did.)

“Gogo, how fast can you get me back to the hospital?” She looked from him to the streets, and narrowed her eyes in calculation, jaw working steadily on her bubblegum.

“Grab on, it’s going to be a wild ride.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SO HOW MANY OF YOU SAW THAT COMING HUH? HUH?  
> I leave you all to imagine how Gogo carries Tadashi, who's taller and weighs more then her, to the hospital. I'm sure that will clear up any lingering sadness. Most awkward piggyback OF ALL TIME.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have to go be a functional human so I thought I'd post this earlier in the day. Also the second theme song of this fic is I bet my life by Imagine dragons.

_You woke up to pain. Bright burning pain. And sensation. So much sensation. It felt like your body was split into a thousand, into a million, into a billion little pieces. And all those little pieces **felt** and sent the feeling back to you. But you didn’t know what any of it meant, couldn’t understand what those million, billion little pieces were trying to tell you. It didn’t stop, wouldn’t stop. No matter how much you pleaded to **slow down please I don’t understand**. You squeezed your eyes shut as tight as you could. There was so much going on in your head and none of it was your’s and it scared the hell out of you. And it hurt. Hurt so bad. A thousand, million, billion bits of sensory data overloading in your head. Someone was trying to talk to you. You couldn’t understand what they were saying. You didn’t want to understand. The words were slush in the air that tried to cram themselves into your head. But there wasn’t any more **room**. You tried to cover your ears with your hands, hoping that would somehow block everything out. Worst idea ever. _

_None of the sensation stopped, the voice was only partly muffled. And even more pain lanced through your arm and your hand and your fingers, all the way to the tips, until it felt like even the finger nails hurt and this was all too much, so much, everything piling itself on top of everything else, until it felt like you were buried at the bottom of your own skull. You didn’t even realize you were screaming until you had to take a breath and then you were screaming all over again._

_A pair of hands, bigger than your’s, older then you, covered your hands, and gently pulled them away from your head, from your ear that burned, set them in your lap and cupped the sides of your face. Rubbing soothing circles under your chin, near your pulse points. It surprised you, cut off the wrenching scream for a few precious seconds. It was important, you knew, that you tell this person what was wrong. Because they could fix it, they always fixed you. You knew this even under all the **noise** in your head. But you had to tell them before they could fix it. You managed to make your mouth and tongue work together._

_“Hurts.” In another time and place you might have been embarrassed by the whimper. But tears are sliding down your cheeks and over the fingers gripping you, anchoring you. And it feels like your arm is covered in fire and your head is still being swamped with more sensory information then you know what to do with. But you told him, so he could make you better. You felt a needle prick your arm, the one that didn’t hurt. Words came again, this time they stuck in your ears and into your head and sunk into your brain._

_“It’ll be okay. Go back to sleep Hiro.” Your mouth opened to deny that you could fall asleep like this, but already you felt drowsy. By the time you had raised one arm to clutch at the other’s wrist, you’d already fallen unconscious._

_And everything was quiet again._

 

Tadashi gently eased his little brother’s sleeping form back onto the bed, tucking the undamaged arm, the one that had a loose grip on his wrist, next to his body but on the top of the covers. The nurse on the other side of the bed pulled out the needle of the sedative and with a nod to Tadashi, began re-wrapping the brunt mess that was Hiro’s other arm. Veins stood out red against Hiro’s skin, where the electricity had traveled through. A spider web of angry red welts crawled up the side of his neck, and ear, ringing his forehead where the original transmitter had been. Circuit marks burned into the skin, just as bright red as when Tadashi had first found Hiro at the base.

Tadashi sighed heavily, slumping onto the hospital bed, still holding Hiro’s arm, his fingers over the slow steady beat of his brother’s pulse.

Around him the floor of the room was littered with once again deactivated microbots, shards of glass, overturned chairs and just the general chaos that comes from having a small swarm of bots being controlled by an out of control, confused, in pain, teenager.

 

When Tadashi had arrived the bots were making it impossible for anyone to get near Hiro. Aunt Cass had been basically run out of the room by them. She’d met him in the hallway.

“He just woke up suddenly.” She’d said, leaning against the wall, her shoulders shaking. “Opened his eyes and sat up. I thought it was a good thing. And then he closed his eyes.” Her voice was raspy with bitten back tears. “I tried to talk to him, get him to respond but he, it was like he couldn’t understand me.” She was talking faster now, trying to get it all out. “He tried to cover his ears. But his _arm_ and his _ear_. He didn’t know to be careful. The bots came before I could get to him.” Tadashi had nodded a hand on his aunt’s arm. He opened his mouth to talk to her, let her know she’d done her best. He never got past that stage as an ear splitting scream rent the air. A wail of pain and terror clawing its way out of a throat run raw. Tadashi knew that scream and had hoped he’d never hear it again. The first and last time had also been in a hospital, _the_ hospital, when he’d been told his parents had died in a car accident. But his brother had made it out. With a broken arm that had to be reset. In the here and now, Aunt Cass’s head hits the wall with a tired thunk, her voice devoid of her normal cheer and eyes watery. She gave Tadashi a small tight hopeless smile.

“And then he started screaming.”

 

The room was a disaster area, and Tadashi didn’t blame the medical staff for not wanting to enter. The small but still sizable amount of microbots left, were careening around the floor and even climbing the walls in parts. Tadashi pulled off his helmet and gauntlets, handed them off to Gogo.

“Hold these for me.”

“Tadashi, be careful, he’s not…” Aunt Cass trailed off, unsure how to end the statement.

“Hiro won’t hurt me, Aunt Cass.” He didn’t wait to hear if she had anything to say to that. All his focus was on the room, and the figure curled in on itself on the bed, as he surveyed the room from the door.

“If you can get him to stop for just a few moments, I can get him a sedative.” A nurse on the other side of the door, pressed up against the wall told him, she was almost yelling at him, to be heard over the noise (screaming). Tadashi nodded, he might not like it but anything was preferable to the current reality.

He takes his first steps into the room, the microbots part around his feet, while still swirling around. Tadashi feels a small measure of relief, Hiro’s still there, still alive, still some bit aware. The nurse pushes up against his back, using what little protection he has to allow her into the room as well. It’s a careful step by step journey; he doesn’t want to go too fast, the nurse has a tight grip on his arm and her shoes bump against the back of his boots. There’s a brief moment of quiet, when Hiro stops to take a breath, all the microbots freeze. Tadashi feels his heart lurch at the shuddering, shaky sound, more like a desperate gulp then an attempt at breathing. It’s only a brief moment, and Hiro is back to screaming his throat raw and the microbots are back to chaos. But Tadashi hadn’t wasted it, and neither had the nurse, stepping quickly through the stilled Microbots to the bed, the nurse looks up at him and nods toward Hiro’s arms.

Tadashi sets one knee on the bed and leans forward, takes his little brother’s hands in his own. Gently, carefully, he pulled them away from Hiro’s head, set them in his brother’s lap. The nurse immediately starts prepping the sedative, pulling Hiro’s undamaged arm toward her. His brother doesn’t notice, he’s still screaming, there are tears leaking out of the corners of his eyes, streaking down his face. Tadashi cups Hiro’s head, mindful of the wounded ear, fits his thumbs under Hiro’s pulse, feels it racing, starts rubbing circles. He wants Hiro to know he’s not alone, he’s not hoping for a miracle, he gets one anyway.

The screaming cuts off. Tadashi flicks his eyes to the nurse, but she just raises her eyebrows at him, the syringe still in hand, unused. His attention switches back to Hiro completely when his brother opens his mouth. It takes Hiro a few tries, but he manages to get out a word. A choked, whimper more than a word, hoarse and rough.

“Hurts.” His little brother says, tears slipping around Tadashi’s fingers. The nurse jabs the needle in, pushes the plunger down, and steps back quickly once she’s done. Hiro doesn’t even flinch. Tadashi swallows. Hiro’s eyes are squeezed tightly closed. No extra stimuli, Tadashi can understand that, if what he thinks is happening is actually happening, then just _existing_ must be painful.

“It’ll be okay.” He promises Hiro. Knows what he has to do to set his little brother right. “Go back to sleep, Hiro.” Hiro’s face twists in a grimace and his mouth opens. Tadashi has to smile, Hiro is still the most stubborn person he knows, but the sedative is taking effect quickly and Hiro’s head lolls, his hand comes up to grip Tadashi’s wrist, before he completely wipes out.

 

Tadashi sits on the side of Hiro’s bed, thumb rubbing circles on the inside of Hiro’s wrist. As much to comfort himself as to comfort Hiro. The chaos is being cleared up as quickly as possible but they’re still going to move Hiro to a new room. Aunt Cass sits next to Tadashi, quiet, with her hand over her mouth, her other hand lightly gripping Hiro’s knee under the blankets.

The nurse says it will be quite a while before his brother wakes up again. Tadashi hopes to have the feedback problem sorted by then, hopes they won’t have to keep sedating Hiro. Gogo stands in front of Tadashi, not saying anything. Much like back at the gravesite, she was silent, not even chewing the gum tucked into her cheek, but focused entirely on him. And this time, he wanted to talk, to work his way through this problem, lay out everything he knew. Hope for a better second opinion.

“It’s the feedback. From the microbots.” Tadashi ran a hand through his hair and rubbed his forehead. “They send out signals to each other and the transmitter. So they can...” He made a vague hand gesture a little too distracted to go into specifics. “do their thing. Know where they’re going, know how to navigate. But Hiro reads as a transmitter now and without the band to block it, he’s getting all the signals from the microbots directly. It’s overwhelming him.” Gogo doesn’t say anything for a moment but she returns to chewing her gum. Tadashi knows she’s thinking the problem over, looking at it from all angles, and she’s going to come to the same solution he did.

“Destroy them all?” Gogo asks, her eyes never leave him. Tadashi nods wearily. His brother’s greatest invention, what got him into SFIT, something Hiro was so proud of, worked himself so hard for and they have to make sure every single microbot is so many shards of metal and plastic. It’s almost worse than having them in Callaghan’s hands. But it’s not worse than having to keep Hiro sedated for the rest of his life. (or having him dead.)

“Yeah,” His voice sounds just as tired, just as worn, just as wrung out as he feels. “Destroy them all.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there's no brakes on the PAIN TRAIN


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the interlude, AKA Tadashi needs some time off screen to quietly hyperventilate into a bag and Abigail was just sitting there.

When Abigail woke up, it was a cheerful, sunny early morning. The window of her hospital room was open and the regulation curtains drifted in the breeze. The walls and floor were white, but not the kind of bright eye searing white, but a much more comfortable off white beige. The sheets and blanket were tucked securely around her form and her arm ached a little bit from the IV inserted there. Aside from that small discomfort she felt perfectly fine. Except for the fact that she had no idea how she’d come to be in the hospital, the last real thing she remembered was going into the portal. And then there was the disjointed memory of being outside rushed into an ambulance and she had no idea how one event tied to the other. With a groan she sat up, rubbing her head with the un-IV’d hand.

“Yeah, that’s how I felt too.” She dropped her hand with a yelp. “Actually, I’m pretty sure my wake-up was worse.” Sitting in the visitor chair next her bed, with a book propped open in his lap, was a young boy. Early teenage years, if Abigail was any judge, with an unruly head of black hair and brown eyes. His legs were folded up on the chair, and she inwardly winced in sympathy because if he wasn’t feeling that now, he would in a few years. He wasn’t wearing hospital issued pajamas like her, instead loose pajama pants and a plain white t-shirt. But the paper bracelet on his left wrist marked him as a patient and his right arm was bandaged tightly and tucked against his stomach as well as bandages wrapping around his forehead and over his right ear. He flicked his eyes up from the book to give her a lopsided smile and she was struck by a sense of recognition, even though she was one hundred percent positive she had never met this boy before in her life.

“Who are, what are you doing here?” Abigail wasn’t sure which question to ask first, so they came out together in a jumble. She had to cut out, her throat was dry and her tongue felt swollen, the coughing fit didn’t help matters. The boy leans over to hand her a water cup that she drinks from gratefully while she tries to make sense of things. Everything was very confusing right now and the only thing she was sure of was that she wasn’t dead. After she handed the cup back, the boy stuck out his left hand.

“My name’s Hiro.” She took the hand, the skin under her fingers was rough with callouses but still smaller than her own.

“Abigail.” He grinned at her and she found herself smiling back. Hiro had a certain kind of infectious charm. “So what brings you here, Hiro?”

“Well, I figured it would be nice not to wake up alone. Kinda confused right now, yeah?” Abigail nods slowly. “I thought that  someone  should explain things to you before visiting hours start and everyone and their mom wants to talk to you. And look!” He gestured to himself with his unbandaged hand. “I happen to have all the free time in the world for that!” There’s a feeling of dread uncurling in her stomach. Something must have gone wrong with the test. Of course something went wrong with the test; she wouldn’t be waking up in the hospital with a spotty memory and only this young boy for company if it hadn’t. “Also, I may or may not be hiding out from my brother.” Hiro confided to her, she can’t help but snicker at him and the kid folds his good arm over his chest and rolls his eyes. The picture of a teenage pout. “He’s gone waaaay off the deep end with being over protective.” She raises an eyebrow and eyes his bandaged arm.

“To be fair to your brother, you did manage to damage yourself pretty well.” Hiro’s grin broadens.

“I totally did, didn’t I?” His tone is far too cheerful for someone without the extended use of an arm due to injury. “I got electrocuted!” Yes, Abigail decided, far too cheerful. She was beginning to understand why his brother was ‘over protective’.

“Electrocuted huh?” Hiro nodded.

“I can’t really move my right arm right now.” He said, somewhat sheepishly. “Grabbed the live wires with them.” Abigail snorted.

“I know my father would lose his mind if I got hurt like that.” Hiro’s tentative smile melted right off his face.

“Yeah, about that…” He began and oh no, the horrible feeling that had alleviated during the interlude came back. With a vengeance. “I, uh, don’t really know how to break this to you.” Hiro scratched under the bandage wrapped around his head. “So I’m just going to lay it all out, kinda like pulling off duct tape.” Abigail didn’t want to know where he’d learned to mess that phrase up. “Are you ready?” No, no she’s not, she just woke up. But she has a feeling that if she doesn’t hear whatever Hiro has to tell her  right now . She’ll never get the complete story. So she straightens her back, takes a deep breath and meets Hiro’s strikingly familiar brown eyes.

“Lay it on me.”

So he does. And at the end, Abigail can’t decide if she wishes he hadn’t. It’s nice to know she supposes, how much her father loves her. It’s nice to know how far he would go for her. It’s not very nice to know that a complete innocent’s life got destroyed in the process. That more innocent lives would have been lost, would have been taken,  in her name . It’s not nice to know that she feels in some way responsible for the fact that Hiro has had to add ‘being ambidextrous’ to his list of skills.(and that’s only the tip of iceberg) That his family had to deal with the sorrow and pain of losing, even for only a short while, such a bright, lively boy.

A kid who snuck out of his own room, to her’s, to sit with her until she woke up, so that she wouldn’t be alone. A boy who wanted to give her the option of hearing the entire story, the whole thing of what her father had done, for her, instead of the run around she probably would have gotten from hospital staff and remaining family.

He deserves it , she thinks, savagely. Her father deserves whatever prison sentence or punishment he gets. Maybe more. She stares at the beige wall across the room and twists her fingers in the blankets and feels the anger grow.

“Hey, hey. Don’t space out on me now.” Hiro drops the book off his lap and onto her bed. Rather awkwardly he climbs onto the mattress next to her and she has to reach out a hand to steady him a bit as he navigates the railing, before he settles next to her. “Don’t tell my brother.” He hisses at her and suddenly she’s engulfed in an even more awkward, one armed hug. With a gap between their bodies where his right arm is.

It takes her a moment to understand what he’s doing and then, in the shelter of his shoulders, she buries her face in the space between his neck and his collarbone as the tears come. It’s not a pretty or dainty little cry, it’s messy and snotty and noisy. Her fingers clutch at the fabric of his shirt and dig into his skin. She howls all her sorrow and rage and confusion. And his shirt can only take so much she knows. She feels sorry for Hiro, he certainly didn’t sign up for a grown woman to so completely break down all over him.

When it feels like she can breathe again, she straightens back up. And bless Hiro’s heart, he looks ready to bolt but stays where he is. He pats her on the arm, smiles at her nervously, as she snuffles and wipes her nose on the back of her hand.

“Are we good? Because I’d totally hug you again, but I only have this shirt and I’m not sure it can take another round.” She laughs and chokes on her last tears, dries her eyes with the heel of her palm. Pretends not to hear the tiny bit of alarm in his tone.

“Yeah, we’re good.” Pretends also not to hear the small sigh of relief. The bed whirs as Hiro plays with the adjustment buttons and when he gets it the way he wants, he flops more dramatically next to her and wriggles around until he’s more or less pressed against her side and the bed rails. Taking up half her pillow space as well, the brat.

“Awesome, shove over, I wanna watch horrible daytime tv.” She wordlessly passes the remote over to him and is careful not to bump his arm.

It’s three hours later, and Abigail has mostly drifted back to sleep, next to her, Hiro is swearing quietly at the program, some daytime spanish soap opera. Which he turned the subtitles off for because they were ‘distracting him’. Apparently, he’s mostly fluent, or at least, can hold his own in Spanish. Who knew? He explains it’s a by product of watching the telenovelas and one of his brother’s friends is fluent, so she teaches him when she comes by.

Abigail feels a bit more at peace with the way things are turning out. Or at the very least not sobbingly hysterically angry anymore. She’s lost a few years of her life, her father is a criminal, she’s not sure where’s she’s going at this point but from her side Hiro says ’cabrón’ under his breath with such vehemence that she has to crack a smile. Maybe everything is going to be okay, if the person who suffered the most for her father’s mistakes can swear so energetically at a soap opera. Which is of course, the exact moment in time Hiro’s brother decides to make an entrance.

By almost kicking her door down.

Well, not really, but the energy with which he throws the door open almost causes it to rebound off the rubber doorstop and slam closed again. Her half open eyes fly wide open at the sudden noise. Hiro lets out a small ‘eep’ as his brother strides into the room to the bedside and fixes him with the kind of glare Abigail wishes she could develop. But then again, it doesn’t seem to work the least little bit on Hiro outside of that small noise, because he relaxes almost instantly. His brother on the other hand, doesn’t relax. At all. His hands gripped the railing of Abigail’s bed as his surveyed his brother, locking eyes intently with Hiro, even bending down slightly to be more on his level.

“Did you hurt anything on the way down?”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Are you in any pain?”

“Nooo.” Seemingly satisfied with this response, his brother’s hand smacked Hiro’s shoulder, more noise than actual force judging by Hiro’s slight grimace.

“What were you  thinking,  you knucklehead?”

“You can’t hit me, we’re in a hospital!” Hiro’s voice was all teasing and it didn’t so much as stop his brother, though it stilled his hand from what looked like an attempt to snag Hiro’s ear.

“Hiro, you almost gave me a heart attack! You’re supposed to  stay in your room .”

“Yeah but that was boring!” Hiro protested, hand absently rubbing at his shoulder.

“It’s not boring.” Hiro gives him the most unimpressed look ever and his brother relents, a little. “Okay, it is, but you need to rest so you can heal properly. You know that.” And now the reason that Hiro seems so familiar is clear. Because Tadashi Hamada was one of the most promising students in the robotics lab she had substituted for what felt like a lifetime ago. And both brothers have the same brown eyes and lopsided smiles. Though Hiro’s is made cuter by far with the gap between his front teeth.

“I highly doubt going one floor down is setting me back all that much. I even took the elevator.” Tadashi’s hand is back to gripping the railing of her bed and his knuckles are turning white. ‘Overprotective’ Hiro had said, Abigail understands why now. “Besides, I took it easy down here. I haven’t moved in the last two hours, right?” Hiro looks up at her with far too innocent looking brown eyes. Oh no, she does not want to get in the middle of this. But that doesn’t seem entirely the play Hiro was going for. Tadashi was so focused on his brother, he hadn’t noticed she was awake. And when he does a double take at her staring back at him, he changes gears so abruptly that Abigail almost gets whiplash.

“Oh, Abigail, you’re uh, you’re awake. That’s...good.” His voice drops from the near yelling to a more gentle tone, even if he sounded halfway to confused. Abigail can feel Hiro self-satisfied smile, Tadashi rallies admirably. “I’m Tadashi Hamada.” He introduces himself, holding out a hand for her to shake. “And you’ve clearly met Hiro.” Abigail shakes his hand, and his are larger and rougher than both her’s and Hiro’s.

“Yes, I remember you from when I covered the robotics lab for my father for a semester.” Abigail is very proud that she doesn’t trip or stumble over the mention of her father. Tadashi’s eyes widen in recognition. She thinks it’s very nice that he also doesn’t react.

“Oh.” and then “ Oh ! Yes, uh that was my first semester at the institute.”

“You didn’t remember her, did you?” Tadashi’s cheeks turn faint pink at Hiro’s knowing words. Abigail never had any siblings of her own; she’s starting to not regret that, watching the way the two brothers play off each other. She’s not sure she wants someone else knowing her so well.

“It was only for a short while.” Abigail says, because Tadashi seems to think it’s a  travesty that he doesn’t remember her. “Besides, I should be thanking you. For saving me.” If anything that makes Tadashi even more awkward, but his hand has eased in the death grip on her bed railing, so Abigail is willing to count it as a win.

“You’re um, welcome?” Tadashi straightened at Hiro’s giggle snort, smacking his brother once more on the shoulder and ignoring Hiro’s teasing ‘ow’. “My bonehead of a brother hasn’t been bothering you, has he?”

“No, he’s not bothering me.” Abigail said. Her hand reached over and ruffled Hiro’s hair, careful of his bandage. “He’s been really very helpful.” Instead of reassuring Tadashi, her statement makes him extremely suspicious.

“Helpful, huh?” He asks, his eyes narrowed at Hiro, in response Hiro kept up his innocent grin. Tadashi studies his brother intently for a few seconds and either does or doesn’t find what he’s looking for. Sighs instead, and pulls down the railing of the bed. “Either way, your doctor and a small hoard of nurses are looking for you.” He tells Hiro, “Come on. It’s dressing change time.” Hiro’s face scrunches in displeasure. And he lets out the longest and biggest annoyed sigh Abigail had ever heard.

“Fiiiiiiiiiiine.” He starts to push himself up. Tadashi’s hands hover uncertainly next to Hiro’s shoulders. “Don’t you dare carry me either, I can  walk .” Hiro hisses at Tadashi, as he attempted to climb back off the bed without jarring his arm.

“Sure, sure.” Tadashi agreed, steadying his brother with a hand to the undamaged elbow, until Hiro was standing on his own two feet, putting the railing back up. “Start walking.” He gave Hiro a gentle shove, scooping the book his brother had discarded off her bed as they went.

“Hiro?” Hiro turned back to her. “Thank you.” He smiled so wide her cheeks ached in sympathy.

“Any time!” He chirped before Tadashi nudged him out the door, nodding goodbye to her as he followed Hiro out. She managed to catch the tail end of their exchange before Tadashi closed the door behind him.

“Oh what the hell is this?” Hiro sounded incredibly put out.

“Language.” And Tadashi’s response was just a little bit too gleeful.

“No really Tadashi, what the hell is this?”

“Hospital policy. Patients not cleared for physical activity have to be transported in a wheelchair.”

“This is so unfair.” It doesn’t have any real heat to it, more a grumble then any real protest and Abigail hears Tadashi’s short bark of laughter before the door cuts it off. She waits until the door is tightly closed before dissolving into a fit of laughter. She laughs and laughs until she sobs. By the time the nurse and the police and the press come, she’s composed again. And she has a plan. No more tears, no more regrets, it’s time to start over again. She doesn’t even think twice when SFIT comes calling.

 

Abigail gets discharged before Hiro, and visits his room on her way out.

He’d made a habit of appearing in her room. Usually before or after visiting hours were over. It had come to the point where Tadashi or their Aunt Cass(a delightful, energetic woman) swung by her room on their way to Hiro’s to collect the wayward teenager. And Hiro’s doctor and nurses came to her first if Hiro was not where he was supposed to be. Namely his own room.

Yet Abigail had not seen Hiro’s room herself. She got the idea he tried to spend as little time in it as possible. Though she didn’t quite understand why, his room is certainly more lively then her’s had been.

There’re flowers and vases and cards and bright happy balloons bobbing in corners. Books and notebooks and a large stack of comics cover almost every surface. He’s chewing on the end of a pencil when she enters, pouring over designs on the paper in front of him, his arm is still bandaged tightly.

“They won’t let me use a laptop or tablet in here.” Hiro tells her glumly, shoving his pencil viciously into the sharpener on his side table.

“Probably for the best.” Abigail says, she’s got enough of Hiro’s character to know he’d be typing with both hands when he’s only supposed to be using the one. Hiro grins at her all the same. “Bot designs?” She nods toward his notebook, an unexpected common ground had been their shared love of bot fighting.

“Yup! Well, kind of. I don’t bot fight anymore, but check it!” He drops the pencil on the side table in favor of shoving his notebook at her. “Tadashi’s not too happy about it. He’s worried about creating another feedback loop with the,” He flicks his hand to the bandages wrapped around his head. “ya know. But it’s way too good an idea to just...not fix.” Abigail nods, as she peruses the redesign blueprints. For such a young, energetic kid, Hiro has surprisingly neat handwriting. Even with his non-dominant hand. She scans the page, flips back to the one before it as well.

“Switching the frequency?”

“Seems like the best and easiest idea. I need to come up with a better safeguard for the transmitter.” He scratched under the head wrapping. A gesture Abigail was recognizing as a tell. “Probably a kill switch or neural pattern recognition or something.”

“You know what happened was a freak accident.” She handed him the notebook. He shrugged, dropping it in his lap to pick the pencil back up and twirl it distractedly through his fingers.

“Something like it could still happen again. People aren’t...people don’t...” He seemed unable to completely articulate his thought, but she could tell what he meant. Some people would look at his microbots and see only the potential for harm. Abigail sighed, there’s clearly a little more going on here than just a simple redesign. “And there’s nothing wrong with trying to improve a prototype design.” She decides to switch topics. It’s something to get into another day.

“I hear you start physical therapy soon.”

“I hear you’re getting out today.” He returns, tapping the point of his newly sharpened pencil against the returned notebook. Abigail folds her hands in her lap.

“Yes, I’m on my way out now actually.”

“Luuucky.” He drawls.

“Here by yourself?” She glances around the chaotic room. Tadashi is nowhere to be seen, but the chair next to the bed that she’s sitting in has his jacket thrown over the back. The stack of books under it has all the titles of medical and robotic textbooks. There’s also a plastic wrapped plate of muffins and donuts on the table next to the sharpener.

“Yeah.” Hiro shrugs. “Tadashi has a bunch of stuff to catch up on at school and Aunt Cass has the cafe to run. The others stop by when they can, but I guess midterms are starting soon?” Well, that explains a lot. Like why he kept sneaking into her room to watch Spanish soap operas and action movies on AMC at all hours. Poor kid was probably lonely. And now she was leaving too. She also wouldn’t have a lot of free time with which to come back and visit either. On instinct she leans over and wraps him up in a hug, squeezes his small frame tightly but carefully.

“You’ll be out before you know it.” Abigail ruffled his hair as she pulled back. Hiro pulls an impressive pout at her.

“But I’m really,  really bored  now .”

“Tell you what,” She leans in, her voice dropping to a whisper. “When you get out, I’ll see you at the Institute.” He frowns at her, adorably confused and more than a little depressed she can see.

“But I’m not a student. I have to wait to reapply at the next showcase because I’m not in a  condition, ” He fairly spits that word out, “to attend and Callaghan...uh...isn’t head anymore.” A delicate way of putting his revoked status at the very least. Abigail has to contain her smile, keep her face poker player blank. It makes her happy, so very happy, that she can give this back to him. For everything he’s been through, for everything  her father put him through, she’s so very glad, so very excited that this, at least, she can put right.

“Says who?” She leans back, smiling at his expression. “If the interim head says you’re in, then you’re in and I have it on very good authority that she’ll allow this.”

“You do? How do you know?” He tilts his head at her, quizzical and confused. “You haven’t even left the hospital and they haven’t announced the interim.  Tadashi doesn’t even know who the interim head is yet.” She starts gathering up her few things.

“Let’s just say, I have some inside information.” She winks at him, and then has to laugh at the disbelieving expression on his face.

“No way.” He breathes, Abigail beams at him.

“Yes way.” She pulls an envelope out of her bag and hands it to him. His fingers are shaking as he accepts it. The official SFIT seal on the front with his name in perfect black ink. “When you’re ready, there’s going to be a space just for you.” She promises, because she can. Because he more than deserves this. Not just for her father, she’s seen Hiro’s work, flipped through his notebook, seen the designs for the original microbots, read through the proposal he submitted. Hiro is brilliant, every bit as smart as everyone said he was and then some. It would be a waste of everyone’s time to make him jump through the hoops a second time, when he’d already more then excelled the first time. “I look forward to seeing you in class.” Is what she says and leaves him in open mouthed wonder.

It will be looked on as a show of favoritism, Abigail has no doubt. But she also has no doubt that Hiro will more than rise to the challenge. He was a bot fighter afterall. And Abigail knows that bot fighters thrived with a challenge. The microbots are only the beginning of what he could accomplish given the right tools, time, support and knowledge. Abigail intends to see that he gets all of that and more. She looks forward to him showing the world what he’s capable of. She looks forward to the future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the pain train might not have brakes, but the feel good train doesn't have brakes either and it's just left the station. CHOO CHOO MOTHERFUCKERS WE'RE ON THE UPSWING


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we're back to the regularly scheduled program of Tadashi having heart attacks. These ones are fun ones though. Well, not for him so much. I'm dumping hints on you all over this chapter btws. BUT NO ONE GETS INJURED OVER THE COURSE OF THIS CHAPTER. 
> 
> Also all you red vs blue fans we got ourselves an easter egg. Hint: 'psychoanalysis for everybody!'

Tadashi thinks he’s doing a pretty good job of balancing school work, hero work, Hiro time and keeping Hiro in the dark about said hero work. Right up until it turns out Hiro hadn’t been the least bit fooled at all.

“Off to go do your heroing without even saying goodbye?” Tadashi dropped his helmet with a strangled yelp and whirled around. Hiro was leaning against the doorframe of the garage with his good shoulder; there was no way Tadashi could play this off. He was completely suited up except for the helmet.

It was late at night and Tadashi had been _positive_ , like checked his breathing positive, that Hiro had been asleep before leaving their room. But clearly he’s underestimated Hiro’s ability to playact. Which was his own slip-up, the kid had been successfully hustling adults three times his age when he was bot fighting not even a year ago. A distracted older brother probably hadn’t been that hard. Hiro looked more amused than anything else currently.

“Hiro, you’re not supposed to _know_ about this!” Tadashi hissed, hands clenching uselessly at the air.

“Please.” Hiro skipped down the few steps from the house to the garage. “You and Aunt Cass do a horrible job hiding it. You can only use the lab excuse so many times after you’ve already completely rebuilt Baymax.” The helmet that Tadashi dropped rolls to a stop at Hiro’s feet. Hiro picked it up and flipped it over, peering at the inside display. His right hand hanging loosely at his side. Tadashi frowned, even with several weeks of physical therapy, Hiro still tended to use his right hand and arm as little as possible. Complaining of stiffness in his fingers and joints. The circuit marks on Hiro’s forehead had faded to a translucent white and his bangs hid them from view for the most part, but migraines were a brand new and exciting problem they’d had to learn to deal with.

“Also the fact that your team numbers the exact same amount of your friends and all have costumes and abilities based on their studies? Yeah, like I wasn’t going to figure that one out.” Hiro’s eye roll conveys more than words how stupid he thought that had been and yeah, okay. Tadashi deserves that; it was pretty dumb of him to hope Hiro wouldn’t put six and six together. He holds out a hand for his helmet.

“How long?” Hiro hums under his breath, still twisting the helmet in his hand, squinting at the inner workings, ignoring both Tadashi’s silent request for his helmet back and his verbal question. “Hiro, how long have you known?” Tadashi repeats in a more forceful tone.

“Honestly? Since I woke up the second time.” Hiro meets his eyes and grins at him. “You were watching the news report and correcting it under your breath.” Oh. “You have only yourself to blame for this one, bro.” Then that meant…

“So while I was killing myself to make sure you didn’t find out, you _knew? The whole time?_ ” Hiro smirked at him.

“Not gonna lie, kinda fun pretending to almost “catch” you and watching you try to come up with an excuse.” Tadashi wants to strangle him, wants to hug him, wants to strangle him some more. That was a lot of added stress he hadn’t needed.

He knows exactly what Hiro’s referring to. Coming back home so early in the morning it was still technically night, trying to be as quiet as possible pulling his armor off, heading back to their room and almost getting his cover blown when it turned out that Hiro wasn’t in bed or asleep at all but was just coming out of the bathroom, or was watching tv in the living room curled up in a nest of blankets or getting a glass of water for pain meds. Tadashi remembers being tongue tied those times, not sure if Hiro had gone down to the garage and found him missing, not sure if he could use the lab excuse either. Settling on saying he was at Fred’s house for movies, or Gogo’s or any of his friends. Not wanting to hurt Hiro by saying his brother hadn’t been invited to the imaginary outings but wanting to keep him safe even more. Waiting out the tense moments to see if Hiro would believe him. Not quite believing when Hiro _did_.

And now to find out that Hiro had known and had probably planned those interactions. Which brought up the question: Why now? If Hiro had known about it for well over several months. Why tonight did he admit to it?

“What changed?” Tadashi asked carefully. There was no way _in hell_ he was going to let Hiro out. Not when his right arm was still weak, not when he still had _episodes_ if he was around certain radio frequency electronics for too long. Not when Tadashi had lost Hiro for those weeks, not when he’d thought Hiro had been dead. Tadashi wouldn’t be able to handle something like that again. Didn’t want to even _think_ of having to go through that again. It was as much to protect himself as to protect Hiro.

“Abigail said I should wait and let you tell me yourself, but really? The way you were going, I’d be dead in my grave before then.” Tadashi hides the flinch at Hiro’s choice of phrase. But then what he actually said sunk in.

“Wait, _Abigail_ knows too?”

“Uh, yeah.” Hiro rolled his eyes at Tadashi; he dropped into his chair next to the workbench, and started hooking cables into the helmet. Using his right hand as delicately as possible. “She’s not dumb either. And she spends like the majority of her day around you guys in the lab.” A screen flickered up in front of Hiro, and his attention turned to that, bright green, a 3D hologram of Tadashi’s helmet and lines of coding to the left. Hiro flicks his fingers and the coding starts downloading into the helmet.

“What are you doing to my helmet?” Tadashi demands, leaning over Hiro’s shoulder, trying to sort through the numbers flashing by.

“Upgrading it.” Hiro tilts his head back to lock eyes with Tadashi. “You almost got brained by falling bricks in that house fire the other night.” Tadashi swallows, Hiro’s serious, no trace of his usual humor. “And you barely avoided being shot in the bank robbery last week. You _did_ get thrown off a rooftop on Saturday. Nice save by Gogo, by the way.”

“You watched that?” Tadashi asks voice rather weak. Hiro breaks eye contact to go back to the screen with a roll of his eyes. He’s been doing that a lot tonight, rolling his eyes at Tadashi.

“I watch it all.” Oh. Not good. _Very_ not good. “ _This_ ,” Hiro breaks the moment, gesturing toward the coding still downloading. “Is going to help that lag problem you got going on. Real time now. Also upgrading your scanner and night vision, might want to take a few to get used to the new HUD, and finally added some infrared and a voice modulator because, why not?” Hiro yanks open a drawer and fishes out four earpieces. “Until you can get the rest of your crew in for adjustments, these will have to do. Voice activated and recognition, mics included, better reception, no static or interference, scout’s honor.”

“You were never a scout.” Tadashi protests, brain on autopilot as he tries to keep up. Hiro just smirks at him in response.

“Be careful with the volume setting, it’s sensitive.” He warns, dropping the tech into Tadashi’s hand. Each earpiece is color coded: pink for Honey Lemon, bright blue for Fred, teal for Wasabi and yellow for Gogo. Even though Hiro said it was just a temporary hold, it’s clear he spent quite a bit of time on these. _Plus they were radios_. “Your helmet is already has it, made sure Baymax had it too. Take him tonight; I’ll be fine on my own.” It’s a lot of information thrown rather carelessly at him at once. Tadashi dumbly accepts the newly upgraded helmet pushed into his other hand, fingers closing around the rim. His mind works to sort through each fact and conclusion and put it in order.

Hiro knows about Big Hero Six.

Hiro watches all the footage of them.

Hiro just upgraded his helmet with a ready-made code and gave him four highly advanced ear pieces, custom made, for their friends with the promise of overhauling their equipment.

Hiro put new coding into Baymax.

Hiro is insisting on Tadashi taking Baymax with him tonight, when Tadashi had been leaving him at home with Hiro since his release from the hospital.

Hiro watches all the news reports.

Hiro’s worried.

Hiro wants to help.

_Your crew_

His brother lets out a strangled yelp as Tadashi lunges forward and wraps his arms around the boy. Squeezes him as tightly as he can without crushing the tech or aggravating Hiro’s still healing wounds.

“Our crew, knucklehead.” He says into the messy mop of Hiro’s hair. “They’re _our_ crew.” Hiro awkwardly pats at his arm.

“Sure, our crew, awesome.” There are a few moments of silence while Tadashi just basks in the feeling of hugging his usually disagreeable little brother. Hiro does not disappoint. “Can you like, let go now? Your armor’s kind of digging into my neck.” Tadashi does, but not without a last squeeze. “I take it you’re not going to let me go out with you?” Hiro asks, looking back up at him.

“Not a chance.” Tadashi agrees, fitting the helmet on and hearing the hiss of the magnetic clamps sealing to his suit. He misses the latest eye roll from Hiro while fitting his helmet. (If he hadn’t, he’d probably be a lot more suspicious of what Hiro did during the day and less blindsided a month later.) It takes not even a second for the HUD to pop up. Much faster boot time. It’s different from the previous one, more comprehensive, less intrusive on his vision. He turns his head from side to side and marvels at how smoothly the display matches his movements.

“How is it?” Hiro’s voice comes in clean and clear through the audio, no crackle or static as promised.

“It’s good, really good!” Hiro’s grin turns self-satisfied and smug.

“Of course it is, _I_ programmed it.” Baymax is already out and armored, waiting for Tadashi. It’s a far different set of armor then what Tadashi had originally designed. Shiny red and purple, his brother’s favorite colors. Tadashi turns his head to stare accusingly at Hiro, trusting he will be able to read his body language through the suit. Hiro shrugs one shouldered at him. “What? I was bored and it was just _begging_ me to redo it.” Well, Hiro did have a lot of spare time on his hands, despite the fact that he was supposed to be taking it easy, _in bed_. Definitely not building armor for Baymax, or _radio_ earpieces for their friends. Tadashi supposes it’s a lot better then having Hiro sneaking out of the house to bot battle. But still.

“We’re going to talk about this when I get back.” Tadashi promises him. He doesn’t like the smile on Hiro’s face when he says that.

“Sure! We can also talk about all the skipped therapy appointments too!” Tadashi refuses to wince, or make any move to let Hiro know how much he’s hit his mark. How he’s thrown down the verbal gauntlet.

After the dust had mostly settled, Aunt Cass had handed Tadashi a list of psychiatrists and told him to pick the one he liked best. Because it was quite clear to her, that while her nephew had prevailed, and she was very proud of his heroic past-times and exceedingly over the moon happy that Tadashi had rescued Hiro, they could not continue as they had in the days after Hiro’s ‘death’. Namely, letting Tadashi try and handle it on his own.

Tadashi had picked one out of the folder, a Doctor Emily Grey, mostly to satisfy his aunt and then had promptly ‘forgotten’ about every appointment she made. No matter how many alarms, post it notes or text reminders she sent.

He’s not sure how _Hiro_ found out about all the skipped appointments, Tadashi knows Aunt Cass keeps it as quietly between the two of them as Tadashi’s role in Big Hero Six. But considering how Hiro had known about _that_ the whole time, he really shouldn’t be all that surprised that his little brother had found out about _this_.

They really need to find Hiro a better hobby to take up his time during the day.

He opens his mouth to say something, anything, to deny, to argue, but then he looks at Hiro. And Hiro is looking up at him, that same sharp smile in place, eyes glinting dangerously. He’s challenging Tadashi, knows Tadashi wouldn’t want to talk about the skipped appointments just as he doesn’t want to talk about his daytime activities. Tadashi closes his mouth with a click.

It’s a lot more than just that. He can see it, now that he’s really looking at Hiro.

Hiro is only fourteen, still a child, still young, and though he can put up a front, he can’t really hide his emotions very well. Certainly not from someone who knows him like Tadashi does. Hiro is worried, it’s in the tilt of his head, the size of his eyes, the forced smile on his face, the flippant way he’s holding this conversation. Hiro is worried, about the team sure, but really, Hiro is worried about _him_. And trying to hide it, because Hiro is really _bad_ at feelings. It’s endearing. How much Hiro _cares_ and pretends not to.

Usually it’s Tadashi worrying about Hiro, not really the other way around. Tadashi knows that for all of his derision, Hiro hadn’t considered the possibility that Tadashi could get badly hurt. Or he hadn’t _used to_. These days, Tadashi isn’t quite sure what goes through Hiro’s head, Baymax’s new armor and team earpieces bringing that home nicely. He’s had to split his time so many different ways, and though he didn’t mean it, clearly the time he does spend with Hiro is not enough. Not nearly enough.

He’s going to fix that.

Except right now, Hiro looks like he’s ready for a fight. He’s worried and angry, doesn’t expect Tadashi to concede to having problems, isn’t going to own up to _his_ if Tadashi doesn’t first. Hiro will fight him tooth and nail on this. And the old way of doing things, basically using his seniority to coax the problem out of Hiro isn’t going to work.

Time to approach this from a different angle.

If he wants Hiro to open up so they can get back to where they were, then he’s going to have to take the first step.

And the first step is admitting you have a problem. Or so he’s heard.

“Yeah, we’ll talk about it when I get back.” Tadashi says gently, running a gloved hand through Hiro’s hair, pushing it back from his forehead and baring the faint circuit marks to the equally faint glow from the desk, Tadashi doesn’t focus on them. Focuses instead on how the look of challenge gets wiped off Hiro’s face, how his eyes widen, how he hadn’t expected Tadashi to pick up the gauntlet, to agree, to call his bluff. Grins at that. He can still surprise his genius little brother. “Promise.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the Feel Good train chugs along and gains some momentum! But what is that!? It's the Pain Train on the horizon!


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WAIT I REMEMBER WHAT I WAS ORIGINALLY GOING TO TITLE THIS. IT TOOK ME A MONTH AND A HALF BUT I REMEMBER!  
> [ODDS ARE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Sw9Fh6uk4Q)  
> FUCK THAT WAS SUCH A GOOD TIE IN, DAMN IT

Tadashi enjoys the expressions on his friends’ faces (what he can see of them) when he hands out the ear pieces.

“So the little guy knew all along huh?” Wasabi twists the teal piece in his fingers, Gogo has already popped her’s in and is sitting back, a bored expression on her face. Fred and Honey Lemon admire Baymax’s new red and purple armor.

“My fault.” Tadashi says ruefully. “He overheard me in the hospital.”

“And couldn’t have mentioned it sooner?” Gogo pops a bubble, arm slung casually over her knee. Tadashi sighs.

“Apparently, Abigail suggested he wait until I was ready to tell him.” That gets everybody’s attention.

“We are really bad at having secret identities, aren’t we?” Honey Lemon laments in the void of silence that followed Tadashi’s announcement.

“Hiro did point out that she does spend a lot of time in the labs, and we did base our suits on our studies. And there’s all the people that saw me and Gogo at the hospital.” Wasabi rubs a hand over his brow, pinches the bridge of his nose.

“So, what you’re saying is...we’re really bad at secret identities.” Gogo snorts.

“Any one of our classmates could know who we are. Based on the suits.” Fred bounds over.

“Well they wouldn’t be able to recognize me! Or Baymax now, dude looks totally different with that armor!” It was true. The armor Hiro had made worked with Baymax’s flexible vinyl material to mold the robot into an entirely different shape. But this reminded Tadashi of something else.

“Hiro said,” He started and then trailed off. He wasn’t really sure how his friends would take Hiro’s offer. Would they be offended that Hiro thought( _knew_ ) he could do a better job when they put so much effort into the suits? But he’d already spoken and his friends were staring at him expectantly.

“Hiro said what?” Honey Lemon prompts him, when it becomes clear he’s not going to continue on his own violation.

“Hiro offered to...upgrade the suits.” Tadashi finally said. And promptly realized he needn’t have worried because Fred all but tackles him with a whoop and Honey Lemon claps her hands excitedly.

“Is he ready to do that?” Wasabi asks. “Upgrading five different suits at once?” Tadashi manages to fend Fred off long enough to say.

“Knowing Hiro, he’s probably been planning since he found out. I’d be surprised if he didn’t have full designs already drawn up and ready to go.” Gogo gets to her feet.

“Too late tonight.” She says, fitting her helmet on. “How about tomorrow?” Tadashi shakes his head as the others start getting ready.

“He’s got a physical therapy appointment tomorrow. Those make him really cranky. Maybe the day after.”

“Movie night tomorrow then?” Honey asks and Tadashi pauses a little surprised. “It’s been a while since we’ve all hung out together outside of school and well, this.” She waved her hand at the six of them.

“It’s been a while since we’ve really seen Hiro too.” Wasabi says. “We could use a break; city’s not going to fall apart if we take a night off.” Tadashi has to swallow past the lump in his throat.

“Yeah.” He says hoarsely, and clears his throat. “Yeah, I think he’d like that.”

 

When Tadashi gets back home, it’s in the quiet dark between late night and early morning. He finds Hiro curled up in the beanbag chair in their room, still awake, tinkering with Megabot. Waiting up for him. Baymax heads to his charging station and Tadashi plops himself onto the edge of Hiro’s bed, leaning his elbows on his knees and watching Hiro watch him from under his lashes as his hands fiddle with Megabot’s innards on autopilot. His right hand awkwardly gripping Megabot, while his left does most of the work. (Hiro has trouble sleeping now, refuses to fall asleep if he can help it. Tadashi pretends not to know the reason)

Tadashi’s tired, physically, mentally and sore all over. He wanted nothing more than to follow Baymax’s example and go to bed.

But he had promised.

“When they first told me you were dead. I didn’t believe them.” Tadashi opens with, Hiro’s hand freezes. “Didn’t want to believe it, honestly. Felt like my whole world was over.”

“Probably not healthy.” Hiro says in a quiet voice, eyes still fixed on Megabot. Tadashi smiles tiredly.

“I’m told it’s a perfectly normal feeling to have when a loved one dies.” Hiro doesn’t say anything else, but sinks down further in his seat. “I love you, _so much_ , you idiot.” Hiro’s head jerks up in surprise, eyes finally meeting Tadashi’s and Tadashi has to smile wider at the look of astonishment on Hiro’s face. Whatever Hiro had been expecting from this talk, it wasn’t what Tadashi was saying.

“And I am so proud of you. I spent _weeks_ after the showcase thinking about how I never told you that enough. How I didn’t hug you enough.” Hiro’s nose crinkles at that. Hiro had been a clingy toddler, but once he’d hit ten, he’d abhorred forms of physical affection. Tadashi hadn’t thought he’d miss clingster Hiro. Turns out he’d been dead wrong. (fist bumps were an adequate substitute though. Something that was all their own. Any two people could hug, but only Hiro and Tadashi knew their signature fistbump.) “I thought you were dead and it would have been _my fault_. And I wasn’t ready to face that yet, I still don’t feel ready, even if you are alive. I don’t want to think about it, about how close it was. So I keep skipping.”

That’s really the root of it. Hiro dying would break Tadashi, did break Tadashi. Hiro dying because of Tadashi? Utterly crushed him.

“That’s not right!” Hiro snapped, sitting up, his eyes had narrowed and mouth pulled into a frown.

“The part about it being your fault.” He clarified at Tadashi’s raised eyebrow.

“You wouldn’t have been there if it wasn’t for me.” Tadashi pointed out, feeling like this was just the tiniest bit surreal. Arguing with Hiro over who was responsible or not for his death.

“No, I would have been safely outside _with you_ if it wasn’t for me.” Hiro jabs his screwdriver at Tadashi. “I totally could have left the transmitter there and just picked it up in the morning. My own stupid need to bring it back with me, put me in there. And it was _Callaghan_ who did all the rest. Not really my fault there, but totally not your fault either.” Tadashi props his chin up with a hand, the corners of his mouth tugging into a lazy smile. There’s still a black ball of guilt in the pit of his stomach, still a mess of anger and sadness. But it’s less than it was. It will always be less than it was.

“Since when did you get so smart, bonehead?” Hiro huffs, twirling the screwdriver lazily around in his fingers.

“I’ve always been smart.” He narrows his eyes at Tadashi. “So you gonna keep skipping?” Tadashi’s next appointment is supposed to be on Friday, it’s Tuesday, well Wednesday morning technically. Tadashi doesn’t think he could get out of it now, not if Hiro knew.

“No.” He says, finally. “I’ll go.” Hiro nods once and sets his screwdriver back into Megabot.

“Good.”

 

It’s not until Tadashi is waking up the next morning that he realizes Hiro got out of his side of the exchange. So he promptly walked over to Hiro’s bed, made sure he was on Hiro’s uninjured side, located his brother’s ear and _twisted_.

“Ow! What the f-heck Tadashi?!” Being the gracious older brother, he chose to overlook that slip.(and ignore Baymax inflating in the background.)

“That’s for sneaking downstairs to make Baymax’s armor and _the radios_.” He says. Hiro groaned and pulled his pillow over his head.

“Had Baymax with me the whole time.” Is the muffled response.

“Not the same and you know it.” Tadashi pats Hiro’s back, his brother meant well. “Just...wait for me next time okay?” Hiro grumbles an affirmative. Tadashi leaves him to fend off Baymax while he goes to get ready for his classes. The sounds of Hiro trying and failing to deactivate Baymax follow him into the bathroom.

“On a scale of one to ten-”

“One! Go away! Trying to sleep!”

“I cannot-”

“I am _so very_ satisfied with my care.”

“That is incorrect wording.”

“I’m satisfied with my care, alright already?!”

It was weird, Tadashi reflects with the hot water pouring over his shoulders, but ever since getting out of the hospital, Hiro’s seemed quieter than before. He’s still the wild child he’d always been, but certainly more _subdued_. Like there was a shadow dogging his brother’s steps. If it weren't for the radios and Baymax's armor, Tadashi would have thought Hiro had a new found aversion to tinkering. He hadn't seen any new blueprints or scribbles or anything that indicated his brother was working on anything new. Considering what happened though, perhaps it’s not so weird. (The microbots were Hiro's first. Though the radios are a good sign.) He couldn't just assume that Hiro would bounce back so completely after what had happened. It might take some time and that was fine. Hiro could take all the time he needed, Tadashi would make sure of that and make sure his brother had all the support he needed.

Tadashi wanted to help, to get into the problem, to fix it, which was hard when he didn't know what exactly the problem  _was_. It wasn’t like Hiro was big on opening up even before the showcase. Pushing him wasn’t going to help here either, Tadashi had to be patient and wait for Hiro to come to him on his own. He's confidant that the talk early this morning, Tadashi opening up, would prod Hiro into reciprocation. He refuses to think Hiro never will.

At least there was one person Hiro willingly talked to outside of his own therapist. (Aunt Cass hadn’t been taking any chances with their physical or mental wellbeing again. ‘I gave you space the first time and you created a superhero team. I don’t even want to know what the two of you will do this time.’ She’d successfully argued.) And that person was Abigail Callaghan.

Tadashi isn’t going to reflect on the fact that Abigail has certainly had a huge influence on his brother. A huge positive one. Hiro _listens_ to her. Tadashi knows what to say and how to say it to get Hiro to do what he wants about seventy five percent of the time. Abigail has an almost one hundred percent track record with Hiro, the business where Hiro dropped the superhero bomb on Tadashi notwithstanding. It’s a practically unheard of record, not even Aunt Cass had that kind of power over his hellion of a brother.

“Shared life experiences.” Abigail had said to him one time. He hadn’t asked her, but she’d almost walked into him on her way out of the cafe, after talking with Hiro. Something in his face must have shown. “He lost a month and a half, I lost a few years. Everyone still thought we were dead.” She smiled at him. “Also, botfighters turned successful members of society. Creates a very exclusive club.” Tadashi doesn’t even have the heart to entertain the thought of being jealous after that.  
He knew that Hiro was still having trouble adjusting to lost time, to being alive when everyone thought he was dead but he’d lost far less than Abigail.

He spares one last look at Hiro, curled under a mound of blankets, on his way out the door.

If his brother could help Abigail and she could help him, then Tadashi had no reason to be upset over it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The pain train is more of an emotional kind. It's picking up momentum.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> some more feel good fro you guys. You deserve it.

Hiro is grumpy and annoyed when Tadashi comes back in the early evening. Sitting upside down on the couch with his legs hooked over the back, his shirt riding up, and his eyes narrowed into slits, glaring a hole in the blank tv screen.

“Stretches?” Tadashi hazards a guess. Hiro shifts to glare at him. More then just the stretches then. Hiro hated physical therapy, but hated that his fingers couldn’t quite manage what they used to more.

“They made me play catch.” He says in an incredibly put out tone of voice when Tadashi drops his bag to sit next to him on the couch. Tadashi has to stifle a laugh and sinks into the couch cushions.

“Oh yeah? How’d that go?” He’s got a pretty good idea. Hiro’s fingers are still stiff and slow to respond to him. Catch was probably a disaster of epic proportions.

“I’m never playing catch again.” Tadashi rubs a hand over his mouth, hoping that will rub the smile off. It doesn’t and Hiro only scowls harder. Physical therapy, while needed and helpful, serves to remind his brother just how far he has to go to get back to healthy. It frustrates Hiro, who’s an active kid, who hated slowing down even when he was sick, or hurt, that he’s not bouncing back as fast as he thought he would, that he can’t do what he’s used to doing. That his dominant hand’s fingers can barely handle typing let alone messing with the complex wiring needed for his projects. Tadashi relents.

“Alright, come here.” Tadashi manhandles a semi protesting Hiro across his lap. So the child was lying on his stomach across Tadashi legs. Hiro grunts in annoyance, his legs kicking up and his right arm sliding off the couch to hang.

“What are you even doing?” He grumbled. Tadashi was very mindful of Hiro’s rogue elbow as it dug into his side.

“Oomph. Knock it off, you’ll like this. I looked it up online.”

“Not filling me with confidence here broooooh. nevermindthen.” Tadashi laughed, digging the heel of his hand harder into the muscle of Hiro’s lower back.

“You’re stressing yourself out too much.” He said, working his way up to the tense muscles right under the shoulder blades. Hiro blew out a breath, head flopping onto the couch cushions.

“Don’t like not being able to use my hand.” He mumbled. Tadashi ran a palm down Hiro’s back, following his spine. He frowned a little at how easy it was to feel Hiro’s individual vertebrae.

“You got hurt pretty bad Hiro, it’s gonna take some time and you’re going to have to keep working at it.” Tadashi reminded himself just as much as Hiro. Hiro merely grumbled, his frustrations boiling over.

“I know! I just...I’m ready _now_. I’m so _tired_ of this!” His legs kicked in the air, punctuating his sentiment. “I’m tired of the headaches, I’m tired of going to therapy, I’m tired of having to ‘take it easy’, I’m _so tired of it_. I just want to _do_ things again!” There’s not much Tadashi can do really, in the face of this, except distraction.

“The gang wants to come over tonight.” It works, Hiro’s brain jumps on the new track of conversation.

“For the upgrades?” Tadashi keeps running his palm down Hiro’s back, like petting Mochi. Except it’s his brother, Hiro doesn’t seem to mind. His legs thump back on the couch.

“Nah. Movie night.”

“Oh.” Hiro sounds surprised, twisting part of his upper back to fix Tadashi with a suspicious eye. “I thought you were just making those up?” Tadashi snorts at the reminder of Hiro messing with him.

“I was.” He taps his fingers across Hiro’s shoulders, feeling Hiro shiver under them. “They wanted to see you. It’s been a while. So, you up for it?” Hiro hums, brow furrowing in thought. He fully turns around, laying on his back in Tadashi’s lap, so he’s staring up at Tadashi, his eyes wide and brown and puppy hopeful.

“Monster movie?” He asks playfully.

“Sure.” Tadashi runs a hand through Hiro’s hair, pushing it back from his forehead.

“Horror movie?” Hiro tries, making his eyes go as round and wide as possible.

“Maybe.” _No_. Hiro sticks his tongue out at him.

“Blugh. No fun.” Tadashi ruffles Hiro’s hair with more force then usual, causing his brother to shriek and try to elbow him again. He sends the all clear via group text as Aunt Cass starts making popcorn and Hiro builds himself a blanket and pillow nest big enough to share.

 

“You should talk to him.” Tadashi almost drops the glass of water in his hand and whirls around. Gogo is right behind him, staring up at him as her jaw steadily works on her gum. He takes a few deep breathes, Gogo is clearly amused, the corners of her eyes crinkle even if her mouth doesn’t smile.

“About what?” He asks, once he calmed down enough from the unintended fright. On the other side of the room Fred says something that makes Hiro burst out laughing over the sound of the movie playing.

“You know what.” Gogo takes the glass of water and the small pills out of his hand. “He _needs_ to talk. It’s pulling him down. If we can see that, so can you.” Tadashi breathes out a sigh through his nose.

“I don’t want to push him, I made my move already. It’s up to him now.” Gogo nods.

“Just don’t wait too long.” she says over her shoulder, walking back to the fray. Tadashi turns back to get his own drink and hears Gogo’s voice.

“Hey kid, magic pill time.”

“Don’t wanna.” Hiro’s voice is a sing song with an underlying tone of ‘just you make me’. Tadashi doesn’t know why exactly, but Hiro’s not the most cooperative when it comes to taking his meds. The pain meds today are because of the physical therapy earlier and the extra excitement from the movie night right now. He knows Hiro has to be feeling stiff and sore right now, his brother’s been moving slower and slower as the night progressed. He was currently curled up at one end of the couch, left hand propping his head up and right arm tucked closely to his body. His head tilted up to squint at Gogo in defiance.

“Come on little man, the sooner you take them the sooner we can turn the movie back on.” Wasabi bargains from the other side of the couch. It looks like he’s sitting on Fred. Hiro’s head turns further to face Wasabi and his body sinks further into the couch.

“Why don’t you want to take them?” Honey Lemon asks from the armchair she’s curled in.

“They make me feel floaty.” Hiro finally says, drawling, “I don’t like it.” after. Tadashi and his friends can read between the lines. The _Oh, Hiro_ is written across Honey Lemon’s face, Wasabi sits back with a muffled ‘oomf’ from Fred. But Gogo doesn’t back down, her arm stays extended.

“You need them.” She says, matter of factly. Tadashi stays where he is. He knows he gives into Hiro too easily and this isn’t something he needs to save his little brother from. “Woman up. We’re all gonna be here with you.” Tadashi can imagine Hiro scrunching his face up at that, but he snatches the pills out of Gogo’s hand, and downs them with the entire glass of water as quickly as he can. Gogo pats him on the head and takes the now empty glass back to the kitchen area. She pops a bubble at Tadashi’s grateful look when they pass each other. “You’re not in this alone.” The sound of the movie starting up again masks her words, but he hears them anyway. And breathes out a sigh of relief.

It’s a reminder that he needed.

 

After the successful movie night Hiro was...better, happier at the very least. A lot more energetic, not as frustrated with himself and his new limitations. There still seemed to be something weighing on his mind. But it didn’t slow him down as much. Tadashi is incredibly thankful for their friends. The movie night broke some sort of invisible barrier, now they came and went as much as they did during the microbot’s initial building. Not just for the suit upgrades either. Tadashi came home late from the lab one time to find Gogo single handedly beating both Hiro and Fred in a racing game. Fred had been manning the right side of the controller and Hiro the left. It turned out that Fred and Hiro co-opted for a lot of games like that. Fred playing the side of the controller that Hiro’s fingers couldn’t quite manage just yet, with Gogo usually standing in as player number two. Though once or twice he’d walked in on Wasabi squinting at the screen and mechanically destroying the Fred Hiro gestalt. When they take their act to the online gaming world, they win some and they lose some.

Honey Lemon had taken to dropping by and continuing the impromptu Spanish lessons she’d started giving Hiro in the hospital. Leaving Spanish novels, movies and music for Hiro to occupy his time with during the day.

Wasabi supervises Hiro’s garage lab time. There are still large gaps of time where Hiro is left mostly to his own devices, but this was the compromise. Wasabi was the only one Tadashi trusted in his absence to make sure Hiro was following all the precautions he needed to take.

“I don’t know how you do it, man.” Wasabi tells him one day before class starts. “I don’t know how you still have all your hair. He’s got almost zero self preservation instincts, I’m frankly amazed he has all his fingers and toes.” Tadashi ignores the spike of dread at the thought of Hiro missing appendages (or dead).

“It’s an ongoing battle.” He concedes instead.

“Yeah well, the cavalry’s arrived. And they are _amazed_.” It’s the first time Tadashi’s really laughed in _months_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So good news bad news again  
> Good news: I only have one more section to write for this fic  
> Bad News: Fic's ending. Y'all got at least three more chapters.  
> Good News: There's the possibility of a one shot sequel.  
> Bad News: Due to other writing projects might not get around to it for a while  
> Good News: Other writing projects!  
> Bad News: Not all are BH6 projects.(but the ones that are, are crossovers~)  
> Good News: Still taking prompts on my tumblr  
> Bad News: Still taking prompts on my tumblr


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> welcome to this week's chapter also titled: What's been bugging Hiro.

Three in the morning seems to be the time to have heartfelt confessions. Tadashi only mumbles a little when Hiro bullies his way into Tadashi’s bed. There hadn’t been any Big Hero Six patrolling that night and Tadashi had taken the time to spend with Hiro and do some much needed studying. Which meant he had been asleep but not dead asleep before Hiro invaded. Which wasn’t an uncommon occurrence, just one that hadn’t happened in a while.   
Hiro used to have nightmares when he was younger, right after their parent’s fatal accident. Tadashi had let him sleep with him then, and over the years whenever Hiro had a nightmare, a really bad one, he’d wander over to Tadashi’s side of the room. That practice had lessened as the years went on, until it had stopped entirely and Tadashi wasn’t sure if it was just because Hiro no longer had nightmares or because Hiro thought he was too old for it.

When Hiro shoves at his side demandingly, Tadashi doesn’t question it, just rolls over to give Hiro room, the mattress dips and shifts as Hiro lays down at his back and gets comfortable, tugging a little at the sheets and blanket. Sticks his cold feet against the back of Tadashi’s legs, Tadashi refuses to rise to the bait, waits Hiro’s restless energy out. After a few minutes of silence and stillness, he started to drift back to sleep.

And that’s when Hiro spoke. His brother was quiet, voice barely above a whisper, but it broke through the early morning silence like a thunderclap.

“It was hard to see because of the smoke.” Hiro murmurs into Tadashi’s back. “And it was hot. I didn’t like it.” Instantly Tadashi is wide awake. He knows exactly what Hiro is talking about. “I figured if I could get to the microbots, I could use them to get out. Was already in the exhibition hall when the fire started anyway. It went _so fast_. Lotta experimental tech that just goes ‘boom’, ya know?” Tadashi shifts back over to curl around Hiro, drapes an arm over his waist to rub circles on Hiro’s back. Props his head up with his other arm. “By the time I got to the transmitter, I couldn’t go back. Too much fire and parts of the building in the way. Didn’t think it would matter because I could just make my own way out with the bots.” Hiro refuses to meet his eyes. His head stays still, messy hair hiding his face from view as he talks steadily and quietly into Tadashi’s chest.

“I wasn’t paying attention, trying to put the transmitter on. It was really _hot_ and hard to breathe. Smoke everywhere. So I didn’t really notice when Callaghan showed up.” Tadashi’s hand stills on Hiro’s back, before he continues rubbing. There was a lot he had to sort out with regards to his old professor. A lot of anger, burning dark in the back of his mind had Callaghan at the root of it. Callaghan had hurt Hiro, he’d hurt Hiro badly.(Not just physically either.) He’d lied to Tadashi, to Tadashi’s family, he’d stolen from Hiro. Hell, he’d _stolen_ Hiro. Without a second thought. And he hadn’t been _sorry_. _How dare you._

A lot of guilt ate away at him, despite what Hiro had told him that first night. Tadashi was the one to introduce Callaghan to Hiro(to put his brother in the line of fire), he was the one who knew Callaghan and didn’t see the signs. _Didn’t know if there were signs to see._

A lot of sorrow too. For what might have been, because Hiro could have learned _so much_ from Callaghan. And now what Callaghan had taught Hiro were things Tadashi had hoped his little brother wouldn’t have to learn until he was much, _much_ older.(He’d seen the new designs for the microbots, seen the neural lockout coding.)  
But Callaghan wasn’t important right now, Hiro was still talking and though Tadashi knew what Hiro was telling him would give him nightmares for weeks, he needed to know. Wanted to know. And, like Gogo said, Hiro needed to tell someone, needed to tell _him_.  
“At first I thought he’d just gotten stuck in the fire, like I had. But he didn’t _look_ right, all freaky eyed and really angry. He came at me and I tried to get out of his way, tripped over something, there was another explosion, a big one. Like _buschoo_.” Hiro’s hands mime an explosion. Tadashi knows which explosion he’s talking about, it’s the one that stopped him from going after Hiro, once he’d seen the building was on fire. The one that had knocked him back, almost knocked him out. The one that made him think Hiro really had died. It kills him a little to know that Hiro had been alive and fighting to get back to him while he’d been outside just staring at the collapsed entryway.

“Didn’t think to use the microbots. I fell, reached out, must have grabbed some hanging wires. But I don’t remember that. I just remember falling, a lot of pain, and waking up in the hospital.” Hiro falls silent, Tadashi tugs him a little closer, dropping his head back on the pillow to tuck Hiro’s under his chin. He feels somewhat thankful that Hiro doesn’t remember any of the time spent with Callaghan. That a whole month and a half of captivity passed without his brother even knowing. Hands fist in his shirt, bringing him back, Tadashi feels Hiro press his face against the junction of his neck and collarbone. He feels more then hears Hiro breathe deeply for a few seconds.  
“He woke me up once. For real, real.” It’s said so quietly and muffled that Tadashi almost doesn’t quite hear it. But he doesn’t make any move to pull back or ask Hiro to repeat himself. This is about what makes Hiro most comfortable. “Very hazy, very confused. I remember wondering where you were. Because everything hurt. I remember asking and he said that you were busy and would be back soon.” Tadashi closes his eyes tightly, it’s not like Hiro was watching. “I thought it was weird, but couldn’t figure...I was really drugged okay?” Tadashi brings his other arm down and around to run through Hiro’s hair. He doesn’t need to justify anything about this to Tadashi, even though he felt like he did. “He asked me about the transmitter, said the one at the showcase wasn’t working all the way. Kept fritzing out.” Tadashi was surprised it had worked at all, considering the charge that had run through it. Obviously it had worked enough for Callaghan to get both himself and Hiro out of the building mostly unharmed. But it certainly wouldn’t have held up to the kind of things Callaghan had planned for. And why waste time trying to figure out how to fix it, if the creator was available to tell you?  
“I didn’t tell him at first. Because it just...it _felt_ wrong. He felt wrong. I didn’t remember the fire then. It just wasn’t right because when I’m hurt, you’re there. And you weren’t but he was, so it wasn’t right.” By the end Hiro was babbling, words coming almost faster then his mouth could shape them. Tadashi hummed softly, hand continuing to pet through Hiro’s hair in comforting strokes.

“Breathe, Hiro, just breathe.” He murmured, following his own advice as well. There would be plenty of time to be angry and upset over this later. Right now, he needed to stay as calm and relaxed as possible, for Hiro’s sake. He felt Hiro take a deep breath, hold it for a count and let it out slowly. Tadashi matched his own breathing to Hiro’s, finding the movement of his little brother’s back rising and falling in tandem under his hand, soothing. A few moments of quiet breathing that ended way too soon for Tadashi.

“He asked if I wanted to help him. I said yes, because that’s what the microbots were all about. Helping people.” Tadashi has to fight to keep himself from tightening his grip. Just when he thought he couldn’t hate Callaghan any more then he already did. “I told him.” Hiro says, into the quiet stillness, voice fragile. “How it worked, how to make a new one, what materials to use, what coding, what programing.” Tadashi can’t help but squeeze Hiro closer when his brother says in a broken tone, “Tadashi, I told him _everything_.”

That was it, the root of the problem. The name of the shadow that followed Hiro around. The thought that if he hadn’t told Callaghan how to fix, how to build a whole new neurotransmitter, if he hadn’t created the microbots in the first place, then Callaghan wouldn’t have done what he did. Which was of course, not the least bit correct, but like Tadashi had blamed himself for Hiro’s death, Hiro blamed himself for Callaghan’s rampage.

Tadashi wraps Hiro as securely in his arms as he can. He feels like Aunt Cass must have with him, back at the hospital, back before the hospital even, trying to gather all the broken bits of his brother up and _push_ them, _hold_ them back into place with his hands. Hiro _shakes_ under his palms, but his breathing is steady and there’s no telltale wetness, so Tadashi is ninety nine percent sure that Hiro isn’t crying.

Which makes this worse.

If Hiro was crying, Tadashi would know what to do. He knew crying Hiro, even if it had been quite a while since the last time Hiro had been brought to tears, he still knew how to deal with that. This quiet breakdown? This was new. And frightening. He takes a deep breath, buries his nose into Hiro’s hair, let’s it out in a sigh.

“It’s okay.” He says, “It isn’t your fault. What happened is never going to be your fault.”

“They were mine. My idea. I made it happen.”

“Yes, they’re your’s.” Tadashi agrees, Hiro shakes harder in his arms. “And you created them to _help_. What someone else does with them, if they use them in a way you didn’t intend, it is _not_ your fault. It’s their fault. His fault.” Tadashi decides to stop dancing around the actual issue. “It’s Callaghan’s fault. His mistake, and his. Alone.” He’s not sure if he made it through to Hiro, the shaking doesn’t stop. And he’s almost ready to repeat himself when he hears it, feels it. Hiro’s breath starts hitching, small, almost inaudible whines and sobs. The feel of wetness on his neck where Hiro’s face is pressed.

Hiro is crying.

_Good_.

“It’s okay.” Tadashi soothes, running his hand down Hiro’s back. “It’s alright, just let it out.” Hiro hasn’t cried, and aside from the outburst on the couch last week, hadn’t had any emotional release about what happened. To be quite honest, Tadashi had been getting a little worried about it. There was Hiro’s therapist, sure, but clearly from the way Hiro had been going on, he hadn’t been disclosing everything. Tadashi tucked Hiro in closer, pulling the blanket over him to give his brother the illusion of privacy as the sobbing got louder, wilder, turned into a hurricane of anger and grief. The fingers in his shirt tighten, digging into his chest, leaving marks on the skin. Feels Hiro scream against his neck, because _it wasn’t fair_. And it wasn’t. It really, really wasn’t. But what was done, was done and they couldn’t change what happened. It had been out of their hands as soon as the fire started, maybe even sooner.

Aunt Cass poked her head around the door and Tadashi managed a smile for her. She nodded and left, came back with a glass of water, left again. He didn’t think Hiro even knew she had been there. He seemed determined to get everything out in one go, every bit of emotion he’d been saving up since the hospital, possibly before, since he woke up dazy and confused and told Callaghan the secret to the neurotransmitter. It was all coming out now and Tadashi held him through it.

_You need to fall apart before you can be put back together_ , Dr. Grey had told him, when he’d unexpectedly broken down during the second appointment. The way Tadashi figures, Hiro had needed to fall apart for a while, but hadn’t been able to. Until Tadashi had made the first move. Hiro had just needed the time to process it, and what it meant before making the next move himself.

Twenty minutes later Hiro started winding down. Screaming back to sobbing, to hiccuping and then complete quiet. Tadashi waited, feeling Hiro’s even breathing, counted to sixty in his head and pulled down the blanket. Hiro’s cheeks were splotched with red and dried tears tracts. But his eyes were closed and his breathing was regular and deep. Fast asleep.

Tadashi gently untangled Hiro’s fingers from his shirt and sat up. Tugging the wet and snotty tshirt over his head with a grimace and letting it drop to the floor, to be dealt with later in the morning. Next to him, Hiro didn’t twitch at his movements, completely tired out. Tadashi was loathe leave him alone, even if Hiro wouldn’t notice. So instead of getting out of bed to grab a new shirt out of his dresser, he laid back down, tucked the blankets up higher around himself and pulled Hiro close.

He wakes up abruptly the next day when Hiro kicks him out of bed.

“You’re not allowed to kick me out of my own bed.” He groans against the wooden floorboards.

“I do what I want.” Is the semi groggy response, and just like that Tadashi knows everything is going to be okay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That sound you hear is the Feel Good train choo chooing the fuck over the pain train.  
> Work's been picking up lately so I haven't had as much time to write as I normally do. This work will finish on time, but after that all bets are off.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now Hiro gets his one shot at center stage. Don't blow it kid, or I'm never letting you out of the box again.

“You know,” Hiro says, propping his chin up in his left hand. “You could have waited. I would have told you anything and everything if you’d asked. Hell, I even had a printout of the designs ready for submission.” Silence on the other end. “But I suppose that would have led back to you too directly huh? Not that it mattered in the end either. What were you going to do after? You were legally declared dead. Might as well have stolen them outright later.” Still nothing, until,

“I’m surprised your brother let you visit me.” Hiro snorted.

“Let nothing. This is an important step in my ‘healing journey’.” He moved his head long enough to make the appropriate air quotes. “Aunt Cass and my therapist and _his_ therapist had to gang up on him for this. He’s pacing the waiting room right now. So I hope you appreciate the trouble I went through to get here.” More silence.

“Do you hate me?”

“I can forgive what you did to me.” Hiro says, tapping a finger against the tabletop. “It was mostly an accident and you did the best your very deranged mind could do to keep me alive.” His eyes narrowed at the professor. “What I can’t forgive is what you did to Tadashi. He really looked up to you, and you really, I mean _really_ , fucked him up. He’s gonna have trust issue for _years_. And, _and_! He thought it was his fault, what happened. Which, let’s be honest, it was _your’s_ , okay, a little bit mine. But for the most part, your’s. Your screw up, your mistake, your fault. So yeah, I _hate_ you.”

“Is that what you came here to tell me?” Hiro grins at him.

“Yes! Also that Abigail is pretty awesome and I’m really glad she’s the new head of the department. And I hope you stay in here _forever_.”

“You reminded me of Abigail.” Hiro makes a face.

“I’m sorry, what?” Callaghan smiles at him, sadly.

“You reminded me of Abigail. A smart energetic child, who was a bot fighter.” Callaghan let out a sigh, even as Hiro bristled at being called a child. “I couldn’t leave you there. I couldn’t...kill you either.” Hiro blinks at him slowly.

“Had no problem trying to murder my brother and his friends.” He pointed out, leaning back in his chair.

“As you said, my mistake.” Hiro nodded sharply, the closest Callaghan would ever get to apologising, Hiro’s chair scraped against the floor loudly.

“Well. I’m done here.” He pushed himself out of his chair, but Callaghan’s voice drew him up short.

“Hiro. Pass along my thanks to your brother. For Abigail.”

“I’m not really sure he’d wanna hear that right now, but,” Hiro shrugged. “We’ll see.”

The closing of the door to the visitor’s room behind him has the sound of finality to Hiro. He rubs his temple as he follows the guard back to the front, where Tadashi and Aunt Cass are waiting for him. The guards’ radios are starting to give him a headache with the high pitched whine sound drilling into his ears and the sooner he can get out of here, the better for his poor abused brain. The side effects of having a neurotransmitter imprint itself directly into your skull are random and annoying. The not being able to be around radio frequency devices for long periods is slowly but surely driving him up the wall. Tadashi went through their room and the house _and_ the garage lab to remove any and all radios, walkie talkies etc. But there’s only so much he can do once Hiro ventures out into public or goes to class and the lab.

Cell phones and Wifi don’t really provide anything more then a far away humming, same as cable. Which doesn’t bother him, thank _god_. Radios though, radios are currently the bane of his existence. Making the team earpieces had been an exercise in different levels of pain medication and management. He can’t even really _do_ anything about it either, except hope that as time goes on he gets more used to it.

Hiro’s pretty sure that his migraines are going down in number. Or they would be. Microbots were way too good an idea to toss. Especially being able to control his own microbots, the microbots he controlled responded faster, more intrinsically and had a longer range then the ones that responded to the bands. He’d run the tests, secretly of course. Tadashi was barely restraining himself just over Hiro’s redesign blueprints. Always right next to him or hovering over Hiro’s shoulder while he worked on correcting the flaws, Hiro could practically _feel_ Tadashi’s nervous anxious lecture never quite getting vocalized but played out in gestures and facial expressions. And he hadn’t even started _building_ the new models yet, Hiro didn’t want to think of what Tadashi’s reaction would be to knowing that Hiro had not only _not_ scrapped the prototype designs, but had rebuilt a handful of them for testing purposes.

No matter Tadashi’s thoughts on the subject, Hiro knows more then half of his brother’s disapproval is more a holdover from the weeks after the showcase and Callaghan then anything else. And while Hiro respected that, there was a stopping point to how much he’d follow the limits his brother insisted on imposing. What Tadashi didn’t know, couldn’t hurt him...or cause him to make disappointed faces in Hiro’s direction.

Besides, Hiro wasn’t an idiot, despite Tadashi’s feelings on the subject. He hadn’t built more than five microbots at a time. Start small, build your way up, a little at a time, just a little at a time. Get used to the signal feedback, get used to the response time, figure out what you could do with what you had, then figure out how to stretch that, how to make things work beyond just what was there. He’s up to twenty, can feel them buzzing in the back of his head under the whine of the radios even now. It’d taken a bit of trial and error and a _lot_ of pain meds, but he’d finally figured out how to _read_ the signals the microbots sent. How to ignore them too. The more there were, the more signals he got, but once he adjusted to them, he could build more. Hiro wasn’t sure if he’d be able to manage the number Callaghan had built. But if he could get there, how _sick_ would that be? He’d be almost unstoppable!

And of course, there was the other reason.

Hiro trusted his brother, he trusted their friends. But there wasn’t any reason why he _couldn’t_ help more then just upgrading their tech, and playing mission control, but he hadn’t even broached that topic with Tadashi yet. (He’s fairly certain that Tadashi _must_ know that he can hear everything the team says and does through the earpieces. His brother isn’t _that_ dumb.) And if Tadashi wasn’t going to let him out, well, he didn’t have to be standing next to the microbots to control them, now did he?

He’s been awake and aware and somewhat on point for almost half a year now, and he still feels like he’s playing catch up. Hiro hates playing catch up, it’s not something he’s used to doing. And it’s been made at least fifty times more frustrating by everyone deciding he doesn’t need to be told most of what went on while he was out.(At least Abigail understood.)

A month and a half of lost time. Six weeks, forty two days, one thousand and eight hours. All gone. Hiro only remembers a vague fifteen to twenty minutes of it at best. He missed _so much_. He missed starting at SFIT, he missed being able to really share a lab with his brother again, he missed his new friends, he missed his own funeral and he missed Tadashi’s slow melt down, of which he’d only been told bits and pieces of, even from Tadashi himself.

_I don’t like to think about it, even now_.

There’s a lot more Hiro could have said to Callaghan. A lot more he could have screamed, but when it came time and he was facing the man down, Hiro hadn’t felt anything but a vague sense of pity and annoyance and he was just... _tired_. So tired of it all. It wasn’t really worth the energy it would have taken to tell the man things he clearly already knew. Hiro jams his hands into his hoodie pockets, sneakers slapping against the floor next to the dull thudding of the guard’s boots.

“You okay kid?” The guard asks as they wait to be buzzed through the last door. Hiro shrugs.

“Just a headache.” The door swings open and wow, it does look like Tadashi spent the entire time just pacing the room. Hiro had only been kidding when he’d told Callaghan that. But the way Tadashi’s head snaps over to them when the door opens, the way he’s standing at one end of the room and the way Aunt Cass’s mouth is tightened into a thin line, tells Hiro he wasn’t that far off base. He smiles, to show he’s okay; Tadashi doesn’t seem to buy it, eyes narrowing at him.

“Headache?” Aunt Cass asks, as she stands up from the waiting chair. Hiro lets her pull him close and tuck him against her side.

“Yeah. Can we go now?” He leans into her side, closes his eyes and breathes in the scent of coffee grounds, and baking bread and the light spritz of floral perfume. She runs her fingers through his hair, wraps her arm around his shoulders. He lets her, because _tired_. So tired, physically, mentally, emotionally. Every sort of tired imaginable. He didn’t think seeing Callaghan would work half as well as his therapist had told him it would. But Hiro thinks he’ll be able to sleep tonight. Hell, he’s going to nap as soon as they get home. Actually no, he’s going to nap as soon as they get in the car. Just close his eyes and let the swaying car do the trick.

“Sure sweetie.” Aunt Cass starts walking, still keeping him close, gently guiding him along. He can feel Tadashi walking behind them, the back of his neck prickling with the intensity of his brother’s stare.

Hiro remembers getting into the back seat of the car, he remembers buckling himself in, Tadashi’s worried eyes in the rearview mirror, he remembers closing his eyes and resting his head on the window.

He doesn’t remember Aunt Cass’s sigh of relief when it becomes apparent that he’s fallen asleep. He doesn’t hear their quiet conversation. Tadashi’s worry over what Callaghan may have said to him, over what seeing the man may have dredged up, Aunt Cass’s reassurance that the whole thing had been monitored, that whatever happened, Hiro didn’t appear to be suffering any negative effects. Just the opposite. When was the last time either of them had seen Hiro sleep so quietly and quickly?

He does half way wake up when Tadashi starts gently tugging him out of the back seat to carry him up to their room.

“Where’m I?” His words are slurred but not the frantic questioning and kick jerk awakening like the last time Tadashi had tried to carry him from the couch, where he’d fallen asleep, to their room. Just a simple question, needing no more alertness then being able to understand the answer. Tadashi adjusted him in his arms and Hiro wound his arms around his brother’s neck without prompting, fingers clutching the back of Tadashi’s sweater. His head pressed against Tadashi’s chest, listening to the steady thumping of his heart, hears as well as feels the one word answer his brother gives.

“Home.”

“Kay.” And drifts back off.

 

He wakes up to bright sunlight peeking through his blinds, groans and tries to bury himself back under the mound of blankets. His plan to return to sleep is ruined when the mattress bounces from Tadashi throwing himself across it.

“No, nope. You’ve slept almost sixteen hours straight.” Hiro tries to keep the blankets pulled over his head, but Tadashi is bigger and stronger then him. “Come on bonehead, just get up and eat something and then you can go back to sleep.” His angry growling turns to whining as his nice dark cave is yanked out of his hands and he’s staring up at Tadashi’s highly amused expression. Dark eyebrows raised over bright brown eyes, mouth curled upwards in laughter. Hiro reluctantly sits up, squints his own eyes against the sudden light and snarls. Tadashi actually does laugh, the bastard, Hiro is never speaking to him again. “Hey buddy. Rise and shine!”

“Dun wanna.” Nevermind, he is going to speak if only to tell his overly cheerful sibling to go away. Before he can flop back down, Tadashi catches his arm and manages to haul him out of bed.

“Too bad. You’ve been sleeping since yesterday afternoon. You need to eat and drink something.” Tadashi eyes him, as he yawns and scratches at the back of his head. “Possibly take a shower and brush your hair too.” A shower does sound nice, now that Tadashi’s mentioned it and Hiro stumbles in that direction, still half asleep, valiantly ignoring his brother’s laughter but accepting the change of clothes he’s handed on the way.

When Hiro comes back, rubbing a towel through his hair, feeling refreshed, clean and a lot more awake, Tadashi is sitting on his bed, waiting for him. Hiro kicks the door closed as he enters. He knew sooner or later Tadashi would corner him over this, and he had been hoping for later. But the sooner they got this done, the sooner they could move on. He drops into his desk chair, feeling it roll a few inches to the left, Tadashi shuffles on the bed so the two are facing each other. Hiro raises his eyebrows at him.

“Well?”

“Did he say anything to you?” Tadashi gets right to the point and Hiro is thankful for that at least. He’s really fed up with everyone dancing around the issue instead of going right at it.

“Uh, duh? That was kinda the point.” Hiro smothered a laugh at Tadashi’s expression, dodges the swat his brother aims at him.

“You know what I meant.” Hiro huffs, but Tadashi does look _really_ concerned about this. (when doesn’t he, though?) So Hiro cuts him a break.

“It wasn’t like that.” He tells Tadashi in his calmest, most serious voice. “He barely said two words to me.” He doesn’t want to _not_ tell Tadashi about the visit, but there really wasn’t anything _to_ tell him. “It was a one sided conversation bro,” Hiro pauses and Tadashi eyes narrow. Damn. “Okay, he _may_ have mentioned that IremindedhimofAbigailandthat’swhyhedidn’tkillme.” Tadashi stared at him, face blank, Hiro stared back, refusing to look down or away.

“I don’t know quite what to do with that information.” His brother finally admitted.

“Uh, nothing?” Hiro ventured, Tadashi shook his head at him and got to his feet.

“That’s all?” _Not really_. Hiro nodded. Tadashi pulled himself to his feet. “Okay.” And wandered back to his side, tugging off his shirt to start getting dressed as well. Hiro drops his towel on the floor and heads to the door.

“Oh,” Hiro starts, stopping with his hand on the doorknob, like it’s suddenly occurred to him, even though it hasn’t. He turns half way around to look at Tadashi. “Callaghan did say something to me.” Tadashi froze in the act of putting on his shirt. “He said to tell you ‘thank you’, for Abigail.”

“I didn’t do that for _him_.” Tadashi says in the measured voice that means he’s really angry. Hiro turned back to the door, tugging it open. He counts down in his head, giving Tadashi some time to breathe as he walks out of the room. He waits until he gets to ten and is safely on the stairs out of grabbing range.

“Result’s still the same.” He called over his shoulder to Tadashi. “You saved her either way bro, now you gotta deal with the consequences!” He’s not just talking about Abigail. Tadashi finds that out two weeks later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yeah. Next chapter is the last chapter and sadly it's not going to be the same length as my other chapters. It's more like the coda epilogue. (it's also not finished yet, whoops.)  
> BUT LOOK! Hiro's getting his microbots back, that counts for something right? right?


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> short epilogue, I procrastinated on this hardcore.

Free fall, Tadashi _hates_ free fall. It’d been a pretty run of the mill night. Up until he’d once again found himself thrown off the top of a building by some very desperate bot fighters turned robbers. How did this keep happening to him?

“ _Seriously_ , Tadashi? _Seriously?_ ” Hiro’s voice is pure exasperation in his ears. He found it a little odd that Hiro was more annoyed then worried. They’d all learned the night after Hiro finished upgrading or redesigning their suits that the little brat had also added in audio and visual feeds that he tracked back at the garage or his room if he didn’t feel like walking that far. And he’d made the audio two ways.

For the most part, it was really useful. Hiro could look up schematics to buildings, maps of the city, bus routes, traffic alerts and send those to their helmet displays or just to Baymax as needed. He monitored the police radios and other emergency lines. It also had the added benefit of keeping Hiro _out_ of the line of fire this time. There wasn’t much danger he could get into sitting back at home, relaying information to them.

On the other hand, Tadashi now had his own private backseat hero.(pun totally intended.) And while Hiro was good about not distracting him at crucial times, all the other times were fair game.

Still, weird that Hiro did not sound scared or upset by Tadashi falling off the top of a building. As he had with other close calls Tadashi had had over the last few weeks. He was more worried that time Tadashi got pushed down a flight stairs then right now. Which means, Hiro’s not worried because Hiro’s done something. Probably something stupid. Tadashi hopes Hiro’s just called Gogo or Baymax over to save him. But of course not, because Hiro can’t do anything by halves. If his brother gets to run around San Fransokyo as a superhero, then Hiro was going to do his best to either join him or help out, in every way he could.

It just hadn’t occurred to Tadashi what that actually meant. Until right now, because he’s not falling off the side of a building anymore. Tadashi’s back hits something hard and shifting, almost knocking the wind out of his lungs. He coughs heavily a few times. But his downward motion has stopped. Completely. In fact, it’s reversed and he’s spat back over the edge of the building to land at Wasabi’s feet in merely seconds. He hadn’t actually fallen all that far.

“The things I do for you.” Hiro’s voice is dry with the faintest touch of amusement in his ear. Wasabi helps Tadashi scramble upright, still coughing a little. The bot fighters are currently frozen or encased in a bright pink goop courtesy of Honey Lemon. Their bots a pile of scrap metal and melted pieces from Fredzilla’s flamethrower.

No one’s actually paying attention to the bot fighters though. Everyone’s watching as a small flood of familiar tiny black and silver bots streamed over the side of the building to swirl into a black puddle.

“Oh no.” Honey Lemon gasps. Putting her hands to her helmet, where her mouth would be. They all knew what the black iridescent puddle was. Tadashi’s hands grip tightly into fists. That complete and utter _bonehead_!

Microbots, Mk I by the design, not the other versions that functioned through a different frequency (that Tadashi hadn’t even let Hiro build yet), but the ones that functioned on _Hiro’s_ frequency. No wonder Hiro had been having more migraines than usual. It wasn’t the radios at all. There must be four to five hundred microbots just sitting there, more than enough to stop a grown adult’s fall from the rooftop.

There were only two people who knew how to make these microbots and the last Tadashi had checked, (this morning, it was part of his wake up routine.) Callaghan was still in jail. This left his brother, his idiot knucklehead of a brother.

“I’m going. to. kill him.” Tadashi growls.

“Let’s not be too hasty.” Wasabi tries to placate. “He did just save you.” The moment is ruined when Hiro, half the city away, safely in his room, cackles in his desk chair, spinning it around half way in mirth. No, Tadashi really isn’t going to calm down from this one so easily.

“You hear me, Hiro? You’re _dead_!”

“Have to come get me first!” Hiro crows over the open line.

“I know where you live!”

“ _Duh_ , you live there too!” The microbots crowd together and then diffuse over the surface of the building, heading quickly back to the Lucky Cat Cafe. Tadashi snarls and takes off after them with Baymax, the rest of Big Hero Six following, Hiro’s laughter ringing through the coms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hiro gets angry concerned slightly terrified lectured at from both Tadashi and Aunt Cass but he gets to keep the microbots. And marvel at how Tadashi went from barely being able to hear hypotheticals about Hiro getting hurt to flat out threatening him himself. PROGRESS.
> 
> and everyone lived happily ever after!  
> OR DID THEY?
> 
> I have three to four more BH6 things lined up, but they won't be released for a while yet. Of course, TMA is an on going project.  
> You've all been amazing and this was so much fun to write! A big Thank You for all the bookmarks, kudos and comments!This is currently my longest fic, I started writing it maybe a week after seeing bh6 in the theaters. When I started all I had was the first scene, the idea of Hiro getting Microbot control and Abigail's scene. Everything else just exploded from there. And now it's done.  
> So thanks for reading, crew.  
> I'll see ya on the flip side.

**Author's Note:**

> Consider this an apology for TMAAI. There's going to be a lot of medical handwaving because I'm too lazy to do proper research. Sorry, not sorry. Also some handwaving in regards to plot holes. Minor ones.
> 
> Title comes from the song of the same name by 3OH!3


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